Posts by James Green
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Dick Smith, $99, comes with a built-in pre-amp because your new-fangled stereo doesn't even have a phono input ...
I keep meaning to rip some of my vinyl faves to digital.
I thought the idea of the new laser vinyl readers sounded amazing. Unfortunately, they're bastard expensive, but it seems there ought to be a good enough market for using such technology (which can, I think, deal to skipping records), to make lovely hi fidelity digital versions of our beloved vinyl. I have a lovely turntable, and I still haven't digitised anything. And it might even have the deep base richness in a digital file that the CD format allegedly is missing.
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Yet again, TV overlooks the thriving local stand-up comedy scene for a bunch of actors with no sense of timing, or delivering a punchline... sheesh!
Actually, at least one of the actors on Paradise does have quite a bit of stand-up experience (Josh Thompson). I think the few times I laughed were usually revolving around him BUT on the other hand, I think that was just because he was funny in isolation, rather than funny as part of a television program.
Oh. And honestly, while mocking Ashburton could be a deeply rich vein to mine, they uh seem to have just gone with some generic and dull cliches. Oh wait, that's pretty much the entire program...
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it's also ruining my musical reputation because of the time I listened to Van Halen's "Panama" about 20 times in a row.
You can edit your last.fm chart if there is stuff that you wish to hide, but I think you only have like a week or so window in which to do it.
Forget about Starbucks being the retailer used in the Wifi/iPod example. Eventually it'll be happening in other shops that play meaningful music. I like the idea of going into a cool shop, hearing some music playing in the store, and being able to to buy it on my iPod right away.
Kinda, except sometimes you can have the most amazing conversations chatting to people about the music they have on. One night at Plato they were playing Pink Panther's Penthouse Party, and it was rool cool, but so was getting into a discussion about it with the owner. Or ages ago at Sirenz (RIP), getting introduced to Fairport Convention....
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Harry Potter books remind me of Dahl. Not so much in the prose style, but in the some disadvantaged child finds something special, but by virtue of their upbringing remains inherently 'good' (Matilda, BFG, Danny, Charlie, the boy in The Witches etc.).
Also, I'm not sure what it says about either Rowling's writing or the state of our education system, but I know a few English teachers, and they all seem avid readers ...
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i'll admit to being on public transport, seeing someone with a copy of harry potter, and thinking, "must be a remedial reader".
I once re-read a copy of a Harry Potter on an evening bus between Auckland and Feilding. It was a remarkably good way to keep occupied.
However, last year, returning from Europe, I needed something to read (f***ing Lufthansa don't have very good inflight ent), and was just disgusted by the price of the pap in the bookshops. Eventually, in a sort of wilfully contrary way, I found a copy of Northanger Abby, and read that between Munich and HK. I had been intending to sleep on the final leg, but I was to have my first experience of travelling on AirNZ internationally, and found the, er, Sauv. a bit nice. Which didn't quite prepare me for the driving hail, 5 degree temperature, and hundreds of exam scripts waiting for me in Dunedin. But it was fun.
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Stott is a psychologist and is about as qualified to comment on diseases of the gut, immunology and PCR testing (all of which are relevant to the MMR claims) as I am.
While I think the MMR/mercury/autism thing is epically epically bad, and I don't agree with Stott, I would rather like to emphasise that psychologists are typically far better trained in statistics and methodological rigour than man, many others. Including the kind of people who are experts on the gut, immmunlogy and genetics, who will receive a far more token nod to study design and statistics than a psychology graduate. It's something medical schools are attempting to address, but I think there is some kind of fundamental conflict between what has been the massive rote-learning of knowledge by medical students, and the much more subtle information integration that is really now required of doctors and researchers.
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So WTF was Bollard thinking when he spent $1.5 Billion of our surplus funds on this dumbRs attempt to devalue our dollar? Surely he knew what happened when the British tried the same in 1992?
There is a fairly key difference between Black Wednesday, and Bollard's little play. That is, consensus is that the NZD won't stay at this level in the long-term and that it is at the outer end of its range (and Bollard was betting that it would go back toward the middle of the range). If, in 12-18 months, the RB starts to lower the OCR, and various other elements of the economy cool, then the RB will be making a pretty nice profit on this. In contrast, I think the GBP was not at an extreme, and the Bank of England was betting in the less favoured direction.
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The simple solution to the Moet issue lies in Marlborough. Louis Vuitton Möet Hennessy also own Cloudy Bay. Their bubbles aint bad neither.
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Rankin: She shared with us the remarkable factoid that there was only one recorded death from natural remedies
This is a dodgy argument, and overlooks a far more massive category of harm. There's a continuum in which substances exert effects. A remedy of concentrated apple pips would kill you very quickly, and cause and effect would be obvious. However, sometimes, the ill effects take longer. Take that whole packet of panadol, and you'll die in a couple of days. But sometimes it's not that easy to see the causation. Cigarettes would be a classic example, but it doesn't always need to be prolonged exposure.
Russell notes that beta-carotene might be bad for smokers. Actually, it might be bad for everyone, along with taking Vitamin A and E supplements. Vitamin C seems like it's OK at this stage, but I'm not planning to start taking multivitamins anytime soon!
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I'm pretty sure Oscar Kightly(sp?) or similar does the NZI "People keep stealing your stuff" one. I'll have to keep an ear out for other ads.