Back to normal programming... well, after this post anyway!
I’ve enjoyed the last two weeks of the Olympics. We’ve definitely seen more of the events than ever before, even compared to Sydney. Everyone I know is now catching up on some much needed sleep & looking forward to Beijing in 2008.
The Australian Athletes have had their best ever games, finishing forth on the table above some notable countries in Canada, France & Germany.
Somehow, I don’t think Beijing will be as easy. I’ve heard reports of the Chinese Government spending over 300 million during the next four years to get their team up to scratch. Considering the host country can enter every event, it could be devastating in what would be pet events for particular countries.
The 17 Gold Medals won for Australia are as follows;
Cycling Road - Women's Road Race Sara Carrigan
Cycling Track - Men's Sprint – Ryan Bayley
Cycling Track - Men's Keirin - Ryan Bayley
Cycling Track - Men's Team Pursuit
Cycling Track - Men's Madison
Cycling Track - Women's 500m Time Trial - Anna Meares
Diving - Women's 10m Platform Chantelle Newbery
Hockey - Men
Rowing - Men's Pairs
Shooting - Women's Trap - Suzanne Balogh
Swimming - Women's 100m Freestyle - Jodie Henry
Swimming - Women's 100m Butterfly - Petria Thomas
Swimming - Women's 4x100m Freestyle
Swimming - Women's 4x100m Medley Relay
Swimming - Men's 200m Freestyle - Ian Thorpe
Swimming - Men's 400m Freestyle - Ian Thorpe
Swimming - Men's 1500m Freestyle - Grant Hackett
Obviously, Australia’s talent lies in a couple of areas! The diving, shooting & hockey medals were a bit of a surprise, as was a couple of the cycling, especially after the drugs debacle before the Games.
Drugs ended up being a significant ugly side to the Games. Marion Jones proved beyond all doubt she can’t perform without a few enhancements & even though she may have been off the gear this time around, quite a number decided to take the chance.
I present the Athens 2004 list of drug cheats;
Genevieve Jeanson – Canada, Michelle Collins – US, Shang Shichun – China, Torri Edwards – US, Szymon Kolecki – Poland, Galabin Boevski – Bulgaria, Zlatan Vanev – Bulgaria, Georgi Markov – Bulgaria, Filip Meirhaeghe – Belgium, Mickey Grimes – US, Kostas Kenteris – Greece, Calvin Harrison – US, David Millar - Britain, Jobie Dajka – Australia, Cathal Lombard – Ireland, Bernard Williams - US, Jovino Gonzalez – Spain, David Munyasia – Kenya, Katerina Thanou - Greece, Ihor Pashchuk – Ukrain, Wafa Ammouri – Morroco, Zoltan Kecskes - Hungary, Viktor Chislean – Moldova, Pratima Kumari Na – India, Sule Sahbaz - Turkey, Leonidas Sampanis – Greece, Irina Korzhaenko – Russia, Robert Fazekas - Hungary, Zoltan Kovacs – Hungary, Anton Galkin –Russia, Adrian Annus – Hungary, Mabel Fonseca - Puerto Rico, Ferenc Gyurkovics – Hungary, Olena Olefirenko – Ukrain, Maria Luisa Calle Williams – Colombia
All 35 athletes above were caught before, during & after the Games for all manner of substances. I had no idea there were so many until I tried to compile this list! Ironically, China, who led the medal tally at the end of the Olympics, scored as many Gold medals as there are people in this list of cheats!
Yesterday, the colleague who flew over for the Opening Ceremony managed to grab an extra copy of the Official Programme which people left behind!?! Since not too many would be floating around, I thought I’d take a few shots so everyone could see what it looked like!
Click on the images to enlarge or click on the "gallery" section for more photos from the Programme.
Well, that's it for a few more years! In final passing news, the Australian medal winners all got to fly home in Business Class with Qantas, while the losers were stuck up the back in Economy! See, being a medal winner does have it's advantages!!
I've always thought it - "Irish Priests, you can't trust 'em!"
What a bizarre way to end sixteen days of competition. Vanderlei Lima of Brazil has been amazingly gracious about the incident. Running a marathon at an Olympic Games is hard enough, let alone being tackled by a nutter, getting back into it & finishing in the top three!
I watched part of the Closing Ceremony this morning on tape, mainly the highly publicised snuffing of the flame which was simple yet elegant.
I'll do a final Olympic entry & include a couple of photos of the Opening Ceremony Programme which I have in my possession, plus the pins which have traveled back from Greece.
The rest of the weekend was pretty casual. I caught up with a friend for dinner at Glenelg last night. After what the weather had produced during the week, it fair plummeted yesterday, so Glenelg was freezing, explaining why so few people were around.
The other news of note is the Federal Election to take place in early October. Already, posters for candidates are hanging from every possible vantage point, littering the landscape. As yet, I don't know who to vote for. I just can't throw my pencil markings in John Howards direction after his alignment with the U.S. administration. The options aren't too much better!
I love the headlines from other web news sources, which are running with the angle - "The first of the Iraq invaders to face public vote!"
I'm only a couple of posts off the big 500 as well!
Way back in August 2001, I decided to have a crack at building a web site. I found I had some space on my ISP's server available & with a bit of help from Macromedia's Dreamweaver, found it was pretty easy to throw some stuff together. The first upload occurred on August 28, 2001.
It originally started out as "Pete's Patch" & I uploaded each entry without the help of the now ever faithful Blogger. After a few months, I wrote a song which inspired the name for the site & it's been "one before unlucky" ever since.
The content of my entries has caused controversy amongst friends, my family still have no knowledge of the site & I always thought I'd go back through the archives regularly & reminisce, but it's never happened. I've tried to stay true with my entries & happy to say I've only ever deleted one post & altered one other due to circumstances which got out of hand!
The online blogging community is an amazing place & I'm happy to be part of it. The creativity & broad range of experiences everyone allows the world to see, is nothing short of fascinating. I don't have masses of traffic coming this way & the competitions out there is far too great to even try in the popularity stakes, but I'm not fussed. I don't quite know how I ever got by without a place to vent or share thoughts in the past, it's been invaluable!
With that said, thanks to everyone who has stopped by during the last 36 months. I appreciate the occasional email I receive & enjoy the comments which have been posted.
I'll be here in one form or another indefinitely, so don't be shy, let me know what you're thinking.
I'll stop dealing with the endless parade of freaks for a few short minutes.
Australia still sits in pozzie number four on the medal tally. I remember a high level Olympic reporter saying that Australia might end up in the top five countries, but he was quickly shot down as an idiot optimist! He may well be laughing in a few days time.
I mentioned before the Games that the drug tally may be more interesting than the one involving medals. There was a list of those caught so far in today's paper & it's getting quite extensive. I can't wait to find out which of the 100m finalists got on the gear. They must be stupid. I'm still surprised none of the synchronized swimmers have been busted for injecting!
I was hooked watching the European Handball semi-final between Germany & Spain last night. It really is just like basketball, only a really crap version of it! Four overtime periods adding an extra 40 minutes to the game, they had to end it with a penalty shoot-out. Germany won, if anyone's interested! The commentators who would have never seen the sport before the Olympics did a pretty good job of getting excited by it, but even they were complaining about how slow it was near the end. I think I was glued to it because I was trying to determine whether it actually has rules. In the end, I decided that it doesn't & changed channel!
Damn, it's nearly 6pm!! I've got more work to do, so I'd better get back to the freak show that I've been dealing with all week!
I’ve nominated Dragon Boat racing as a new Olympic Sport. Kent thinks Unicycle racing might be workable!
If you look hard enough, there are a number of sports in the Games which, as noted by the crowd levels, no-one has an interest in!
Tennis – They have too many tournaments already.
Table Tennis – It’s good to watch on rare occasions, but I agree with Jules that it probably shouldn’t be worthy of Olympic status.
Rowing – If you could halve the number of heats & halved the distance, it might hold some attention.
Walking – Should be kept for Sunday mornings with the dog.
Handball – Looks stupid, is stupid!
Sailing – Not exactly a spectator sport.
Equestrian - We all know my thoughts on this one!
I’m sure there are others which should be ditched, but this is a good start. If they do go, there would be a bit of space to fill during the 16 days.
The question is; what new & visually exciting sports, even if they are only demonstration, one-off events, should be included in Beijing 2008?
I’ve been watching Australian Idol rather carefully this year. The level of talent is much higher & a couple of real standouts.
However, I watched the first few performances last night, then flicked channels & ended up watching the entire Women’s Table Tennis Bronze match! I’m not sure whether I was actually interested in the game, intrigued by its novelty or drawn in by the intensity of the crowd. What I do know is I backed it up by viewing the Gold medal playoff about an hour later. I think that covers my desire for table tennis for another four years!
I managed to catch the second half of the controversial Women’s Eight Final of the Rowing earlier in the day. The Australian team finished last after Sally Robbins collapsed from exhaustion in the boat with a few hundred metres to go. I understand why the rest of her team is pissed off. If you have nothing left to give in your final race, I would expect that you would probably end up in hospital on a drip, like runners & the occasional tennis player does. But Sally was holding interviews after only a couple of hours after the event.
The solution in the future should be that anyone not pulling their weight can be thrown overboard & the team can continue. Sure, they might swerve all over the course, but if they won the thing…. how impressive would it be?
In all things Olympic, geez Australia is doing good. Our athletes have pulled off another couple of Gold medals with an unexpected win by Anna Meares in the Women's track cycling 500m time trial & a very expected win in the Men's Pair rowing by Drew Ginn & James Tomkins.
The depth of athlete's in the track & field events has never been substantial, so the forth place in the medal tally will take a hit during next week. Experts have predicted Australia will finish in the top five countries, but it seems a bit of stretch with so many medals still on offer.
Australia played Puerto Rico in the basketball a few hours ago. Unfortunately, the Boomers lost after leading for all but the last five minutes of the game! They still have a match to play but they can no longer make it to a medal position.
A guaranteed gold medal tonight will be Grant Hackett in the Men's 1500m final at the pool. It would be good to see Craig Stephens also get up for a top three placing. Craig has won a silver medal for swimming the heats of the relay, but since he didn't swim the final, wasn't able to be part of the formal presentation. This guy just keeps having all the big moments stolen from him!
I was watching the rowing before thinking "What about having dragon boat racing in the Olympics?" Don't tell me that wouldn't work!!
In a complete state of Deja vu, I was out last night at the hotel, did a bit of casino work & managed to drive home at a time when all the traffic lights are green because no one else is going through them.
The one major difference was a couple of hours of karaoke, which if you recall from last Friday, was a failed mission. Karaoke is the domain of the Japanese, who were out in force & volume at "K Box" in Hindley Street. The place is set up a heap of small rooms for hire, therefore avoiding performances in front of dozens of unfamiliar faces & keeping any embarrassing attempts among friends. The selection of songs is huge but missing a few of my preferred artists. How they could not have Split Enz is beyond me! I had to make do with Billy Joel, Phil Collins & even a touch of Moon River.
The Casino later, or should I say earlier, in the morning stole my money for the first time ever. I've either walked out in front or square in the financial stakes, but last night I must have checked my luck at the door, because I won a mini jackpot & then lost it & later discovered that I also left my Action card in one of the machines, so there's another $1.35!
It was a good night, but I have felt so flat today which I need to snap out of. Maybe I just need sex, it's been missing for a while!
I hoped it would happen & it did. Australia played the U.S. in the basketball last night & it was closer than most people thought it would be. The ten point difference in the final score line wasn't the blowout it could have been in the end & I'm still confused at the lack of aggression in the last few minutes by our team.
At such a late time in the game, it would have been worthwhile rushing the ball, taking shots & picking up fouls, knowing how ordinary most American teams are from the free throw line. Get all the good three-point shooters on court & go for it. The worst that could happen is the Aussie shots don't land, the Yanks nail every free throw & the score blows out to a larger margin.
This is the Olympics & I thought it would have been worth the risk!
We play Porto Rico next, who beat the U.S. in their first round, so it should be a good match up.
Equestrian events should not be in the Olympic Games!!
I'd love to know what everyone else thinks about this. I just can't understand how someone who rides a horse can be called an athlete in the same realm as the gymnasts, runners or swimmers, when the real work is being done by the horse!
I know it would take a fair bit of work to train & control a horse under competitive conditions & I still consider it to be a sport, but does it make it worthy of being a part of the Olympic Games?
The next target (excuse the pun) of event to get the chop would be the shooting, but since it's boosting our medal tally, I'll let that one off the hook for now!
I was going to do an entry about all the empty seats at the Olympics, but it's been done to death elsewhere. It's just a shame that it's being emphasised in Athens when past Olympics have had to implement "rent a crowd" tactics to fill seats!
Anyway, I caught Australia & Angola playing in the basketball last night & thoroughly enjoyed it. I used to watch every basketball match of the National Basketball League (NBL) when they were shown on TV. It seems to have drifted into oblivion with virtually no matches being shown!
It was great to see Adelaide 36ers legends like Brett Maher & Martin Catalini on the boards again. Both players were in the Sydney Olympic team but due to a bit of bad blood within the team & coaching staff, they remained on the bench until it was impossible to win. When they did get floor time, they would amass points from every direction & end up being some of the best scorers for the games, but when you put the best players on with a few minutes remaining & a 30 point deficit, miracles won't even suffice!
Thankfully, another hero in Andrew Gaze, flag bearer for the Sydney Opening Ceremony, has been given a commentary gig after being an Olympic team member for quite a few Games. I did get a shock in seeing Tony Ronaldson running around the court! I haven't seen him play for ages & thought he may have given the game away! I must be a little out of touch!
A match up with the Boomers & the U.S. Dream Team would be awesome to see. The U.S. hasn't done too well so far, despite the total value of all their players being upward of US$600million. The rumour is that the American players only train twice a week & most of the other countries train every day. The Dream Team has simply gone to Athens under prepared!
For a sort time, mid-afternoon Athens time, Olympic history was made with Australia leading the medal tally with nine medals over China with eight. Of course, upon waking up this morning, we have been relegated to second, never to reach that pinnacle again!
Overall, Australia is doing a whole lot better than expected. Sure, the pool was always going to earn a few chunks of gold matter, but a couple of completely unexpected triumphs have occurred, which has made national heroes of those who would generally be considered "also-rans".
Our blokes in the cycling couldn't handle the heat, but Sara Carrigan knocked off favourite, Judith Arndt from Germany to claim the gold medal in the Women's Road Race.
Then came the first ever Australian medal for Women's shooting, by Suzanne Balogh, in the Women's Trap.
Ian Thorpe managed to win the "Race of the Century" overnight, being the 200m freestyle. While in Sydney at the Olympic Park Aquatic Centre, I was able to measure my hands & feet against a concrete imprint of Ian's extremities. I can honestly say I have never seen anything quite as huge as Thorpy's hands & feet. I'm not a big guy at 175cm & everything, (yes, everything) is in proportion, but my hands are just half the size of an Olympic Champion. Hence the reason he wins so much stuff. He has no hands & feet, he has ruddy great big flippers!!
In sixteen days time, I'll have square eyes & be twice the size. I don't watch much TV anymore, but I'm wearing a bit of a dent in the couch with all the sport that's on!
Congratulations also go out to both Channel Seven & SBS for sharing the coverage of the Athens Olympics. It's great to switch between stations & catch a variety of events.
Of course, the swimming is going as planned, with a world record for our girls in the 4x100m relay & Thorpy retaining the 400m freestyle after Craig Stephens gave his spot to him!
However, the hottest ticket in Greece isn't to an Olympic event, but to the Sparta Club, with Roy & HG! All the journalists who caught the boys in Sydney & Salt Lake want to be in the audience this year & with only forty seats available, The Dream is an exclusive event & probably the only one sold out! Since it's about to start, I'll cut this post short & get back into it tomorrow.
It was a long day yesterday. Long, but good, so that's okay!
Up at 6:30am, at work before 8:30am for an executive meeting, lunch with the boss (because he asked me) but I don't know why. Finished the work day around 6pm, met a couple of people at the bar for a few Friday night drinks, headed to the casino to end up about $40 better off! Dinner at a little Chinese restaurant, a tragic search for a Karaoke bar, ended up back at the hotel for... more drinks. Made it home a bit after 2am, watched the last part of the Sydney Olympic Opening Ceremony which was being replayed, then sat & watched the entire Athens Olympic Opening until nearly 7am Saturday morning!
Yep, 24.5 hours between sleeps. I could have passed out waiting for the cauldron (or is it a big match-stick?) to be lit, but I held on until the very end.
Thankfully, it was all worth it. For all the dirt which was slung in the direction of Greece, they sure stepped up to the challenge! Both the earlier predictions were wrong, but the final result was pretty spectacular.
From the water in the stadium, the massive disintegrating head, the stunning parade costumes & the laser double helix, it was all very cool in my opinion.
For the first time, I actually sat through the entire athlete march! I'm thinking the dance music helped out here. The order of countries determined by the Greek alphabet was novel & managed to keep the commentators on their toes.
The only thing I heard a complaint about was the cauldron, which they say was not very ambitious. Let's face it, the lighting of the flame in Sydney was amazing, but geez, for a while there, the world thought it had all gone wrong & it had! Athens was a bit more straight-forward & it worked a treat! The only thing that really could have gone wrong, is if they had the gas flowing at high speed when the thing was pointed directly at final torchbearer, Nikos Kaklamanakis!
If you weren't going to watch the Olympic Opening Ceremony live, here are a couple of reasons why you might want to change your mind.
During the dress rehearsal for tonight's ceremony, the crowd decided to get rather political & booed the volunteer carrying the American flag & then cheered for the Iraq, Palestinian & Afghanistan flag bearer! If there is one place a bit of unity should exist, it's surely an Olympic Games. In the past, crowds have raised the level of applause for countries which have faced adversity in making it to the games, but I think it would be a shame if there's a heap of heckling based on non-sporting events. Everyone is there to compete on the same principles, so they should be able to!
The other rumour is a bit of nudity, heralding back to the ancient times when wiggly, jiggly bits were all the rage. The ancient Olympics were performed in the buff, so why should it be different this time around?
I've been running around sorting everyone's computer issues for most of the day. Each & every issue is completely unrelated to one another as though Friday 13th decided to come a day early.
The ADSL line collapsed during the night, which of course meant no-one received emails or access the internet. Of course, when you end up controlling all computer type stuff in a business & then tell people the error is with Telstra, everyone thinks you're lying! It's one of those warm, fuzzy, get me the hell out of here feelings!
Officially, Telstra have stated the fault was unknown & not directly their responsibility. Unofficially, from two very different sources, the story was that they botched an upgrade of the ADSL network at around 2am.
So, thank you once again Telstra, for getting me into trouble!
In all things Olympics, head over to Centrebet & place some money on your favorite athletes! I'm sure the Games would be far more thrilling when you're hard earned money is on Sofaine El Azizi from Algeria in the Fencing at $1001. (Psst, I hear he's a sure thing!)
The soccer or "football" in international circles is under way. Greece took on Korea & finished with two a piece, and then Australia drew 1 all with Tunisia. No wonder they start the soccer before any other Olympic events, because if they all draw in this manner, it'll take a while to find a winner!!
Over on the official site, you can drill down & find out the attendance at each event. The Greece soccer team had 25,152 people show up while only 15,757 viewed the Australian game. Having the home ground is a huge advantage as was also the case in Sydney.
Well, here we go. I'm getting all spirited & flying the Olympic flag for the next couple of weeks.
I plan to be one of many who'll be getting up at 3am or staying up all night to watch the opening ceremony of the Athens Olympics.
Am I crazy? Most likely, but seeing an uncut version before Channel 7 rips it to shreds with advertising for the 11am repeat, will be worth it.
As far as this little site is concerned, I don't know how much Olympic gear I will cover. Thankfully, if the Opening Ceremony is that early in the morning here, then most day time sports will be occurring during the evening. At last, something other than TV police dramas!!
So let’s get into it;
First up, I should have another table at the side which calculates the number of drug cheats per country. This may end up a better competition than the medal race! A few have already been discovered in various countries & Australia has followed suit with a cyclist or two. Even a boxer from Kenya has tested positive today & will be sent home! I just hope they keep tabs on the synchronized swimmers. We all know they're on the gear!
Once again, the Aussie swim team is hogging the lime-light. Thorpie better bring home an extra bag full of metal to live up to the hype. Unfortunately, the swimming occurs in the first week of the Games, which also means that the following week will be endless replays of the 1500m final, just to ensure that if you missed it the first few hundred times, you can still watch the entire fifteen minute event from the start as soon as you switch on the TV.
It seems without Cathy Freeman in any athletic events this time around, the attention has turned to Jana Pittman, even more so now she has gone from tragic injury to being able to compete again. It's just a shame that some of our other athletes are over-shadowed. In a small column in Monday's paper, one of our gymnasts has had to fly home after an injury & beside the article is a damn near life side spread of Jana. It has become a bit of a tradition to focus on one or two sports & the associated athletes when the Games are broadcast. Hey, we all love the swimming, but I'm sure they have other sports, don't they?
I'm fairly disgusted with United States & Britain in their decision to send armed troops to protect their countries athletes. Since neither sent troops to Australia in 2000, this is a direct result of their terrorism fears. Doesn't this mean the terrorists have succeeded? The Greek Government who were opposed to international forces being involved have back-flipped probably under severe pressure. The Greek population should be offended by both the U.S. & U.K. who believe the Greek security personnel can't protect the Games.
I think that's my "two cents" for the moment. More triumphs & tragedies, medals & miseries, superstars & sufferers, as they come to hand!
An early morning phone call from your bank telling you a large withdrawal has taken place & overdrawn your account is one hell of a way to wake up!
Thankfully it was an innocent error, a case of funds 'crossing in the night' & not quite ending up in the right place at the right time. I'll still get absolutely flogged with fees, even though another account easily covers the shortfall.
In the time it took to sort out what had happened, I had those horrible thoughts of someone stealing my identity, copying my credit card, searching my computer & then going on a huge spending spree!
Here's a guy who at age 42, can still whip all the elite runners in Australia, as proven in Sunday's "Sun Herald City 2 Surf".
'Monas' still holds the record for the the race, at 40 minutes, to cover 14km. That's an average of 21kph, which is sprinting for most mortals.
He ultimately came third, beaten by tow long-legged Kenyans, one of which was last year's winner. There's no doubt they deserved the top two spots on the day, but it was just great to watch an aging runner take it right up to the stars of present.
And all of this whilst providing the odd bit of commentary for Channel Ten.
I think everyone is wondering today whether, he might have actually had a shot at winning the event if he hadn't been disturbed along the way!
For all those Australian Idol fans who wouldn't mind going along to the final show for free, enter the tipping competition over at the official web site!
I've ended up a competitor on the spur of the moment with someone here at work & we should have a good shot at winning the thing! Okay, so there's absolutely no reason why we will win, but darn it, we'll give it a red hot go!!
I need a new tipping competition to dive into. I'm fifth in the workplace footy tips, seven behind the leader. First place was all but wrapped up until they achieved a single point from this weekends round! Second place is hotly contested, but I don't think I'll be taking any prize money this year. (Winning it & also running the competition probably looks a bit dodgy anyway!)
A few weeks ago a report came out about a police officer who ran their stations footy tips much like myself, but he managed to cheat on the side! He's been suspended from duty & may be stepped down from the police force because of adding extra points to his tipping results!! Crazy, but true!
Anyway, if you see the team "One Horn" at the top of the Australian Idol tipping board, you'll know who's winning! (don't ask about the team name please, it's way too cryptic!!)
Since it was such a crappy weekend weather wise, I spent a fair amount of time sitting at the computer, looking for a house to purchase, catching up on my lack of blog reading & at the end of it all decided to skin the site.
It's obviously not up yet, but before the end of the week it'll be unveiled & should be in play for a couple of weeks. (If anyone checked out the site during a specific twenty minute period yesterday, my cover would be blown!)
I like having a template which is reasonably simple to change. Overall, the alterations took less than an hour & quite simply, that's really all the time my attention span will allow. I don't even know if a potion of it will work correctly & I actually need permission for one of the graphics!
The idea of website manipulation always seems fun at first thought. The reality is after about half an hour, I would rather be doing something else.
That probably explains why the simple & effective stripe which currently exists is exactly that... simple & effective!
I don't know why I keep reading the Advertiser & Sunday Mail. Both are made up of the material which can be described as borderline gutter trash.
Today's Sunday Mail has a two page spread on the dangers of Poker Machines & their detrimental effect on society with a couple of interviews with those who have fallen into the gambling trap & lost tens of thousands of dollars in the process. The article is playing on the socially appropriate tune of emphasizing the enormous problem of Poker machines.
The disturbing part of the spread was a quarter page article on the same page. The article rates the poker machine types in order of payout frequency, so players can theoretically go to their local pub with a better chance of winning.
Is this not sending out the wrong message to those who may have a gambling problem? Those who do, are more likely to analyse the story to increase their odds, rather than make the connection of their own lives, to the examples of people who discovered too late their gambling problem.
Anyone in the hospitality industry with any knowledge of how Pokies operate, understand that no one really walks away a winner. The whole idea of poker machines is to generate revenue for both the operator & Government. No strategy will beat a computer program. I've seen people at more than one property in the companies group sit for literally hours, dropping coins in a bottomless slot, trying to win big. The biggest possible prize at any place other than a casino is $10,000, so they would all be far better off with virtually any other form of gambling.
The only Pokie winners I know are those which have had a couple of coins in their pocket they wanted to get rid of at the end of the night. In these cases, the player expected to lose & any win is a bonus, especially if it covered the cost of that night's entertainment & meal!
Overall, I don't know what point the articles in the Sunday Mail was attempting to prove.
I've officially held a ticket to the Opening Ceremony of the Athens Olympics!
Unfortunately, it wasn't mine but that of a colleague who leaves for Greece on Monday.
Instead, I get to take over the financial control of an entire group of companies with seven properties around Adelaide. Oh, such power & control!!! (insert evil laugh). Actually, it's not that special, just lots of checking that everyone else is doing their job correctly & not bringing anything into financial ruin. Effectively, it's more responsibility without any monetary recognition!
I've updated the gallery with my new pins. Both sets are in good condition except for a couple of minor dings (if you look carefully), but I've also found that both the Coke puzzle sets are quite rare with only 1,500 & 300 sets of the coloured & gold produced respectively!
Various office curios
Why is it, if you holepunch sheets of paper & then for whatever reason, need to punch again, the holes never end up in the same position?
Why is it, when you set up a large print job & decide to be efficient & do something else whilst the job runs, do the first three sheets print (enough to ensure it's printing okay), then it either runs out of paper or jams?
Why is it, whenever computer technicians are in the building, all the equipment operates flawlessly, but as soon as they leave....?
I think that's a pretty good summary of myself dealing with Murphy today!
I'm finally in possession of my Coca-Cola pins which I bought through eBay & the coloured set to match the gold set of Coke pins which is pictured in a post below.
I got a good deal & just in time, because the guy which operates the alwayscc.com website & store is closing down & heading back into the ice-cream business! He has collected Coke memorabilia for decades, but due to the pressures of running a business for collectors, he hasn't had the time to indulge with his own collection.
I'll update the gallery with the new sets as soon as possible.
Today is hopefully a good share trading day. I say hopefully, because on of the shares I own has plummeted, so I bought more in the hope that they'll recover tomorrow & I'll make a fair bit of money. I also sold off some dodgy resource stocks for a $350 profit & the price has dropped since!
Making money on the stock exchange is such a hit & miss affair. Unless you have some good insider information, it's a case of playing the experience you have against what everyone else is thinking. When you lose money to start off with, like I did, you soon learn how to play. Now I'm up overall & just making a few extra dollars on the side which is nice!
I'm getting really pumped for some new music to be released by a bunch of favorite artists & they are all going to deliver either this month or next.
Pearl Jam are releasing yet another live album entitled "Live at Benaroya Hall", which seems pretty pointless considering all their shows are now released as official bootlegs. The show in question is acoustic & obviously the Unplugged genre that MTV started can still rake in some dollars. From the reviews it's been receiving, I'll be heading out at some point today (the day of release) to pick it up.
The Finn Brothers, being Neil & Tim, have again collaborated to release their second album "Everyone is here". Both are amazing performers in their own right but when family sing together it rarely goes wrong.The album is released in Australia on August 23, but is currently available in the U.S. where they are currently touring.
Mark Knopfler is releasing his fourth solo album "Shangri-la" which is hopefully more like the first two albums rather than the last. I learnt to play guitar by studying Mark's style, so I await some more amazing finger-picking on September 28. Hopefully it gets released here with a bonus DVD as in the UK. It will also be one of the first albums to be released in SACD format with surround sound (if you can find the equipment to play it!).
Something for Kate have pulled out all the b-sides from past singles & put them all together on a double CD called "Phantom Limbs". Although I've got plenty of the songs already, it will be nice to have them all in one place. It's released on August 23.
Red Hot Chili Peppers have finally recorded a live album! "Live from Hyde Park" was taken from three shows during June & if they play as hard as they have at the Big Day Out shows a few years back, it should be good. Yesterday, I noticed the DVD of the Peppers music videos has been released, which originally came out as a bonus on the greatest hits CD. Anyone interested should look around for the CD/DVD limited edition & save themselves $30!
Bjork's latest album Medulla also hits the shelves in August & I've grown into a bit of a Bjork addict recently. She can be a little "out there" to some, but with every listen to her works, I think she falls into the genius category!
So there you have it! All the new music I can't wait to get my hands on.
There's gonna be a whole lot 'o listenin' goin' on!!
