2007 in review

We appear to have come to the end of another year. As is the tradition at this time of year, I shall now provide my own summary of my favoured events, in chronological order.

January: 5-0

Revenge was sweet, as Australia scored an Ashes whitewash for the first time in 86 years or so. The greatest bowler in the history of the universe, Glenn McGrath, retired from the game in style, and the poms were sent home with nothing. Except for the Ashes, that is. They’re such bad sports that they won’t even let us keep the trophy.

January: Tool

This was the second time I have seen Tool. Awesome.

July: Cadel Evans

In the closest ever top three finish, Cadel Evans became the greatest ever Australian cyclist, finishing just 23 seconds away from the yellow jersey in the Tour de France. This is despite having one of the weaker support teams. Next year for sure!

August: The Farm

This was the seventh (?) trip to the farm, and with the biggest fire yet, it was certainly one of the best. Highlights include drinking, cooking dead animals, and lighting stuff on fire. Oh, and my successful comeback to the exciting sport of postie bike riding. This time, without the crashing into tree part.

September: The Combat Wombats

For the first time since 2005, we put together a Futsal team. Despite our final position on the table (10 games, 0 wins, 0 draws) we had a fantastic season and I’m confident that we can only go up in 2008.

November: Dani Ecuyer Dummy Spit

It was a bumpy road for Dani Ecuyer. Running for the seat of Wentworth against her ex-boyfriend George Newhouse, and sitting MP Malcolm Turnbull, she caused a bit of a stir in the media.

A satirical piece on this site was the final straw for Dani, who believed that Miranda Devine was really calling her a left-wing harlot. This response was posted on votedani.com:

Miranda Devine, Caroline Overington and Climate Change

Well well well, it seems the sisterhood only works in theory. It’s official I am having a real impact on the incumbents and I have now been called a ‘harlot’ by Miranda Devine.’ So I work on Climate Change and the pulp mill. Two super hot issues in election 2007, especially in the Environment Minister, Mr Turnbull’s electorate. Now I am a ’stiletto thumping femme fatale’ and a harlot to boot. Amused, well I can assure you I am not amused in the slightest. I am running on real issues and have two websites to prove it, not to mention a serious career in investment banking.

And it went on… Of course, this post was removed from her site shortly afterwards. Obviously a friend let her in on the joke.

Thank you Dani, for brightening up an otherwise grey campaign.

November: Maxine’s victory

I would like to say that the Labor victory in November was one of the highlights of the year. However, as I believe that Kevin Rudd is the spawn of the devil, I shall only pause to commemorate Maxine McKew’s victory over a populist PM who had it coming for a long time.

My grandmother once recounted how she had believed that “Honest John”, as he was known back in the 90s, was going to be great for the country, and we were going to have sunshine and roses every day.

Eleven years later, even the staunchest Liberal voter would have to admit that Johnny had lost his sheen long ago, and that the lies had always been justified by the electorate’s hip pocket. Thankfully, no longer will this be the case.

December: The Wedding

Yes, on December the 15th I married my bride, Sarah. This signalled the end of the first stage of my life, as I settled down and became a responsible member of society.

That’s what I told Sarah, anyway.

To the pub!

Well, that about sums up all the important events of 2007. I’m off to Tasmania for the honeymoon, and will be back at the end of January. Bon voyage!

Postlude: I would like to wish a quick congratulations to Mr Nicholas J. Broadbent, and his magnificent fiancée Mel. Nice one!

Careful - floodwaters!

Driving through the torrential rains on Victoria Road this morning I stumbled across an interesting phenomenon. One section of the road was flooded - the water was about a foot deep in the right hand lane, and probably just under 2 feet deep in the left hand lane. Obviously, everyone in small cars wanted to go into the right hand lane to get through.

The left lane being basically empty, you would think that the experienced offroaders in their Pajeros and X5s would zoom up the left hand lane and plough through the waters, much like the advertisements you see on TV. But no! Despite their obvious years of off-road experience, the soccer mums merged into the right hand lane as well, afraid to get their undercarriages wet.

Anyway, the 50% excise discount on four wheel drives is clearly doing the job it was designed to do. Vive le revolution!

ADSL

My contract with the worst internet company in the universe expires at the end of the month, so it’s ISP shopping time. Things have changed a bit since last year, so now it looks like I’ll need to get a new modem as well.

I’m looking at Exetel’s naked ADSL2 plans - one thing that has always annoyed me is that I’ve been forking out $30/month for a home phone which I don’t use. $50/month for 8GB peak and 48 GB off peak looks good, but there is a minimum 12 month contract which I’m not a fan of.

As far as the modem goes, Exetel sell a NetComm NB6Plus4W for $100, which I assume is a pretty dodgy model. The other option I’ve looked at is an Asus WL-600G for $115.

Has anyone out there in internet land recently gone through the ADSL minefield? Need some advice, and I’m too lazy to search Whirlpool.