Skip to main content
Jul
31
2013

Christmas Island: Tai Jin House exploration

My suspected real life Crazy Dog House on the Cliff allegedly contains a museum these days.  For various reasons we've never quite manged to get to it.  Apparently neither have my parents, but as it turns out the opening hours are really awkward and you need to either be a tourist or taking time off work to go to it within the very short opening hours (Thursday and Friday 10-3).

Mum, the kids and I rocked up yesterday (Tuesday) and it was nice to see the place had been cleaned up a LOT.  Last time Josh and I were here we had wanted to explore the outbuildings, but they had been horribly overgrown and potentially hazardous so we'd mostly refrained.

Tai Jin House from the carpark

Jul
27
2013

Christmas Island: nature trail and Albert the robber crab and friends

It's been mostly overcast with bouts of rain so the last week has been kind of slack and kind of relaxed.  We've been three times to two different beaches (though I didn't take photos of the second beach partially because it was late when we went and I wasn't sure how good the photos would turn out in that light, and mostly because I was going to be swimming as well, could have given it to my dad though), one loopy nature trail (which was slightly longer than I thought but a decent walk nonetheless, and we didn't go to the lookout because it was probably too long a hike for the kids) and a few epic Minecraft sessions.  I haven't got as much art done as I was hoping but bits and pieces are getting done.  The kids have been watching a LOT of Pokemon, a couple of other movies and reading books borrowed from the library (independently during the day in the case of the bigs; they each have a book on dinosaurs and Tao has one on space and Ru has a cookbook in addition to bo

Jul
21
2013

Christmas Island: first day at the beach

It was slightly overcast and we almost didn't go thanks to a (relatively) minor allergic reaction I had to lunch, but we got there and it was good.

Cantilever and jetty from Flying Fish Cove with three cute kids in the foreground

Epic shot! Or at least one that I was really glad turned out good

Kids heading out to the water

Threw this one in just because it's cute

Jul
18
2013

0C

This is what my weather widget claimed the temperature was when I woke up my computer (and after all the bits and bobs had caught up) at 7:30something in the morning.

Get stuffed this is Perth >_<

Jul
16
2013

Approxiprimer build notes

Erm...note: these are actually notes for me so I only have to do other similar systems once (hopefully), not a bek's guide.  If they come in useful for someone else to follow great, no guarantees blah blah blah.

System:

Horize Clevo W110ER from Logical Blue One (on sale at time of writing) AU$919 with 3 year warranty

Specs

Jun
13
2013

On Cars 2

[first scene - spy movie sendup]

8yo: how do they get all that stuff on the car? It's not big enough.

[at some point during sweeping cinematographic scenes]

8yo: how do cars grow? How do cars make stuff anyway?

Husband: ...you're thinking too much into a movie that has talking cars.

Apr
25
2013

The Quest for an Approximation of a Primer pt1: base system

The "Primer": a fictional computer ("book") in a work of fiction called "The Diamond Age" by Neal Stephenson.  It is carted about by the child and absorbs information from its surroundings and uses that information to construct appropriate learning experiences for the child in a narrative fashion. 

Apr
18
2013

There's a problem with your Google+ profile

Dear Google

bek is part of my real name.  I am currently running under the assumption that it was either my initials (of my real surname) or my handle (ryivhnn, which I use on Youtube, Artician, deviantART and as a username on the Diaspora pod I'm on, though the display name there is bek) that triggered WASPobot as I hope your code isn't so defective that you would ping me for a string that was entirely your construction (all I did was choose that particular display).

Google thinks it gets to define what "real names" are

Apr
12
2013

!schooling 0000D25c - E01n | Apr 8-12

Last week and a bit have been slack and uncoordinated partially due to Easter and mostly due to the sleeping pattern going seriously out of whack resulting in myself and the kids going to bed way too late (me because I was staying up late to finish stuff off and also to make sure the bigs were asleep before turning out their light, and them because I have no idea).

Mar
03
2013

Four

Cub dressed up as the green ninjaI have this gorgeous little boy.  This one right here.  Recently, he turned 4.

The day he turned 4, I teased Josh about feeling old.  We missed kung fu training so I could cook a sausage stew for his birthday dinner (Josh is perfectly capable of making sausage stew I think, but the kids seem to think he doesn't do it right).  He wanted to go to the zoo on his birthday but because it was on an adults at kids' prices day, we put off to the weekend so Josh could come too.