Category stupid

Dec 3 2010

tips for avoiding Scrooge characters at Christmas

I like Christmas, just the essential bits, like seeing family, remembering Christ’s birth, getting together having food / games / presents etc.  I don’t like moaners and complainers, this is why this item is called:-

Most annoying things people ask at Christmas:-

Ways to get Scrooge like smug know it alls shut up over December….

“Ah, I read the other day Jesus was born on April / July / etc, so Christmas should not be celebrated at the end of the year.”

Great, gee, would you like to start a campaign to change Christmas then?

“I don’t like Christmas it should be stopped, its too commercialised.”

No one is forcing you to spend vast amounts of money.   Tell friends and family, you are going to limit presents to x per person.   Its just a celebration to stop working for a few days and spend time with family, no one is forcing you to get into debt, more than you celebrate another occasion, ie: spend too much money on holiday in August.   Only put up the number decorations to your individual threshold of taste.

I have seen some of the Jewish holidays like Purim turned into a psuedo-Halloween dressing up fest by some people, all holidays can be twisted into something awful.    I am sure St Patrick didn’t intend to make a significant portion of the nation of Ireland wake up a simulataneous hangover halfway through March.

Alternatively, ask your boss if you can work on 25-26/12, then leave the rest of the non-moaners/complainers to celebrate the season.

“I read the newspaper and the council are going to stop Christmas decorations / hymns being played / pictures of baby Jesus in the city centre….”

Stop reading the Daily bloody Mail then!

Of course on my next article I will show whats happening in Jerusalem for Hannukah…

Nov 30 2010

Jerry rigged IT and network bodging

As all IT systems admin people know, all policies, procedures should be documented, and correct stocks of tools, software, spare parts and test equipment should always be on hand.

Some call it bodging, kludging or jerry rigging, I sometimes call it redneck IT.  Just like every other trade, often you find you have to make temporary fixes or make do with some crude repairs to make some workable to get the job done, until budgets and resources allow for a better method.

Actually me and the rest of the team have done a lot of work to avoid spaghetti cabling, PCs that were falling apart and introduce safer and better methods but every now and then, you can may have to use some eccentric ways of working..


1. Power supply kludge. This USB external hard disk had its power supply lost.  I looked everyone to find it, I needed to get some work done in a hurry, so you can reuse a normal ATX PC power supply as a power supply to run anything that needs 5 or 12 volts.  To do this I used a piece of cable with barrel connector off another adapter which was not compatible.  The wires are pushed into these 4 pin disk drive connector.   Next the block connector that normally connects to a motherboard has the black and green pins shorted together with a small piece of wire to act as an on switch.   At the moment I am not using this external drive for anything important, just for backing up the contents of the below Toshiba laptop that belongs to a friend.

2. Tuna fish projector stand. (No picture) Once a month, in our foodbank we have some teaching, music and worship with all the staff and volunteers.   To make the projector display at the right angle, I normally have to grab several tins of tuna underneath to get the projector to display at the correct angle.

3. Reusing Windows licence key. This is my favourite IT bodge of late.  Sawing bits of plastic out of dead computers to reuse Windows licence keys.  This Toshiba laptop belongs to another volunteer and is running Vista, and is doing some odd things which Vista PCs often do and its horribly slow.   I used a recycled Windows XP licence key from another wrecked Toshiba laptop I fished out of a garbage bin last year, this just means a square piece of plastic has to be sawn out of the bottom of the scrap system.   I then tape this onto a CD case and install a genuine copy of Windows XP Pro from the CD in my collection and restore a back up of my friend’s files, along with Open Office and Firefox and some other useful apps.   Everything is much much faster and smoother now.   The recycled licence key works perfect and so does the online genuine advantage checks.   This build took a long time as Toshiba don’t offer XP drivers for this computer and took hours of Google searching to get all the right ones.

The unusual red symbols on the keyboard is because this as a Canadian keyboard and has some French specific keys.   Yes this violates the Windows licence agreement, but you can’t easily buy a new copy of Windows XP anyway.

Bye bye Compaq laptop, you served me nearly 3 years (after being retired from me previous employer) until the video card fried itself.  I have a kind person who is giving me a replacement laptop which needs some minor fixing when I get back to the UK, and most of the remains of my Compaq went to Russia, Greece, Ukraine and Czech Republic via ebay. 🙂

Of course if you have old broken laptops or PCs (in the UK or Israel) which are not worth fixing or going to get thrown out or are just sitting in a cupboard, I can make use of the parts and raise some support for my charity work in the Middle east.   Please message me if you want to help this way.  I can also rescue files off systems that won’t start in most cases and make sure all data is securely wiped.

I saw this picture on a humour site today, which made me laugh.   Reason being we actually we have a server room which is also a converted from a toilet.   It doesn’t have the pan still there, but there are still the tiles though.

What do you do when a once hugely expensive Macintosh G5 tower system at work breaks and a new motherboard costs a bazillion shekels and has to be imported from somewhere?

Well, after reusing the memory, hard disk and other pieces I was wondering what to do with it.   You can be completely heretical and build a new PC into the chassis of the Mac like here, but this takes a lot of craftsmanship skill to cut and file the insides to fit.   The shiny, precision made aluminum case is too pretty to throw in a bin, but my boss says it most go.   I decided to put in out on the street with a piece of paper, with ‘Free – please take!’ in the end.  When I went home from work it was gone…..

Nov 24 2010

Portsmouth and Jerusalem

The antisemitism watching blog ‘Seismic Shock’ (front page here) has come up with good stuff again.  http://seismicshock.wordpress.com/2010/10/10/the-small-print/
I was particularly interested about the boycott Israel meeting that happened in my home city of Portsmouth.
I was hugely relieved that there are no names of churches from my city involved, but usual attacks from various characters mentioned by Seismic and general political blogs like Harry’s place (not specifically pro-Israel, but have very good expose of unpleasant extremism stuff regularly)
The focus on the blog talked about the get together from various Methodist churches, it is sad when antisemitism comes from not just from stereotypical skin heads but from within churches, and this creates division and gives a poor impression to non Christians in my community.
For me this is not a representation of Jesus, but slander aimed at a nation that is not perfect but we are biblically obliged to pray for.  Its important we reject the common error of replacement theology (that is that Israel of the bible was permanently rejected by the new covenant of the church which Paul says is false in Romans)

In addition to this, modern day BNP-style political thugs the EDL, were on the news for protesting and intimidating Muslims also in Portsmouth outside the Jami Mosque.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-11752757

Some people maybe scared to visit Israel because of fears of terrorism, but in reality, I feel safer on the streets at night in Jerusalem than Portsmouth.  As the recent above story and immense dislike of the neighbouring city of Southampton, there is a fair amount of political craziness from Pompey.

Someone else I know did this kind of comparison of two cities they have lived in and showing the nicest parts of each.

There is some similarities here, both cities once had the same football club owner at the same time.   Both have a lot of history, although Portsmouth is 800+ years old, Jerusalem is about 4 times older and has about 700,000 people compared to Portsmouth’s 200,000 odd.

Both places you walk somewhere and bump into someone you know in the street.

Some of these comparisons are often more to do with the relative (Israel = 7 million, UK = 65 million) size of the country, thus the logistics of supplying things into this place as opposed to any political reasons.  Some things come out in the shops much later here in Israel (like the iPhone that wasn’t officially on sale until Autumn 2009)  also because of reasons like the unique nature of the Hebrew language which I guess was only probably implemented recently.

I have not mentioned things like terrorism threats as actual attacks are these days a rarity and certainly less deaths than an average robbery or domestic murder in a western city.

There is a wide range of different ethnic groups here, people are free to practice their own religion without much interference.

Of course both places share some bad things like lack of parking too.

Better things in Jerusalem

Excellent family life, most children have two parents, divorce/separation rate seems low

Not much crime or drugs

Not much issue with drunks/alcoholism

Vast range of places to eat out

Vast range of coffee shops and easy to get wireless internet

Fruit and vegetables are plentiful locally and cheap

Old city markets are great to get beautiful carpets, ornaments, spices, ceramics

People like to socialise a lot, but not always around alcohol, so going out is safe and fun for everyone in almost all cases.

Warm Mediterranean climate, its been often over 30 degrees in November.

Attractive design of buildings with consistent white stone facade on the outside gives this city a unique character

Most houses have their hot water heated using solar panels on the roof

Police and soldiers in the street all around give a sense of security and safety

Mobile phone usage seems quite cheap and there’s no problem with signal (despite this city is on several mountains)  120% (ie: lots of people have two) of Israelis have mobile phones.

Bus service is cheap and quite easy to get anywhere – just remember to hold on tight once you get on as they don’t wait for you sit down…

Immigration unlike many other countries is actively encouraged (if you are Jewish) A blessing to Jews who have previously lived in nations that were hostile or dangerous to them.

Better things in Portsmouth

Food (tinned/packaged) is much cheaper

You are never more than 1/2 a mile from a curry restaurant

You are never more than 100 yards from a pub

Road safety is above average, and most people’s cars have to be in safe and good order

Electrical fittings, switches, etc in shops and houses are not often wobbly or fall off in your hand

Health & Safety is strict, so you won’t walk past building sites where workman work around the public without fencing etc.

Bus drivers are mostly polite and don’t drive off until you have sat down

Relatively good amount of political stability

Going to bordering countries (France, Spain, Channel Islands) requires simple security clearance without being asked lots of questions

Its easy to buy spare parts for your car, IT hardware, other specialised things without having to have them imported from somewhere else

Very little risk of drought, and water infrastructure works well

Note: I don’t really like political debates and so I am quite fussy about whats allowed in comments below.  Sensitive subjects are welcome in a private message.

Nov 12 2010

Paul Chambers in Twitter airport bomb joke trial

Theres lots of fuss about Paul Chambers who was upset about an airport who mentioned about wanting to blow the place up.   See #twitterjoketrial or #IAmSpartacus for those wanting to look up on Twitter.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10436629-71.html

Its true people should have freedom of speech, but in all honesty, writing things on Twitter is like wearing a hat with velcro letters stuck on it, only write things you are happy to make public.

Now a large proportion of the Twitter community are defending this chaps actions as ‘freedom of speech’    I think this is daft.  If you write something that jovial that might be misconstrued as a threat to a country’s borders in a communication medium which is public, you are really asking for trouble.

Prolific Twitter Stephen Fry has offered to pay the fine for this chap.  Seriously Stephen, when you were a comedian and actor you were terrific, but when you go on Top Gear and announce one of your favourite apps for your mobile device is for having casual Gay sex with strangers then I kind of lost respect for you.   Keeping your nasty habits to yourself please.  Plus this man seems to spend his whole life in Twitter, and where as I like Apple’s products, the clique that use them as little electronic security blankets really quite pathetic and silly.   Please Stephen, get back to good television and British wit, oh, and get back to doing another Blackadder again.

This might mean using some common sense and not updating statuses about yourself when you are upset or angry about something, do something sensible like phone up or better meet with a close friend when you want to rant about something when you have a bad day.

Oct 30 2010

Parcel bombs from Yemen to US

Just heard in the news about alerts that parcels containing explosives from Yemen were bound for a synagogue in Chicago in the United States.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11654390

It would appear from a lot of news stories, that this was a bit of an amateurish attempt at terrorism and this was a test run, to analyse security on delivery and logistics companies like UPS.

I think Muslims and the media that says that try to convince 9/11 Mosques are a good plan, have questions that need to be answered here.

I know people who worked for an IT company in Portsmouth UK, 7 years ago that did some overseas installation work all over the world including Yemen.   It sounds like shipments from this country are likely to be suspended.    What kind of impact does this have on people in Yemen with ordinary businesses that want nothing to do with terrorism?

Yemen is a poor Arab country, nestled between the polar-opposite economies of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.  With strange things happening this month in the news like ex UK PM Tony Blair must be hugely embarrassed of his sister in law Lauren Booth who is ultra pro-Palestinian and become a Muslim recently as already an apologist for Iran and Hamas.   Shouldn’t spokesman in Yemen and other the Arab countries, regardless of what they think of America, Israel and Judaism, ought to be condemning these attacks, as this is only going to hurt the reputation and economy of their own nations?  This is a good opportunity to do some PR work for Islam and shun extremism is it not?

Yemen had a sizable Jewish community, but its one of a few countries that is now more or less a void for Jews as they all moved to Israel or America, in the same way that other Jews from the other mostly Islamic Arab nations had faced hardship.

But in recent years, Yemen has some people coming to Christ.  http://islamdom.blogspot.com/2007/10/2000-converts-to-christianity-in-yemen.html Please do pray for Yemenite people to see ‘dreams and visions‘ and find Jesus, and for those who who already believers to be safe from persecution.   Of course Israel and the west, US and Europe are likely to be on higher alert, so pray for terrorism activity to be exposed and stopped.

Oct 9 2010

Location based services online and your privacy

Privacy eh?  Its spoken about in the media how we should be careful what we share online, but it seems the general public, whether they are casual or regular dabblers in social media, including those who use IT at work, put their fingers in their ears and just say “La-la la la!”

Something that concerns me is Facebook now have this new feature where you can report where your current location.  This could be quite useful if you find a friend is actually only a few blocks away in a pub somewhere.

iPhone users have been doing this sometime now, with strange apps like Foursquare and Gowalla.  The rest of non-mobile web can see their Facebook/Twitter feeds filled up by spam posted with annoying things like “I just bcame mayor of XYZ pizzas & co.”  or “I am in my mansion”   The first one sounds like some kind of board game, with the user with portable device in the outside world, being a counter on a board like monopoly.  Putting links to a google maps of your house and when you are out of your house really isn’t very smart.

Teenagers make up a large proportion in Facebook of course and now I have seen a couple of young people do the same with posting maps of their homes.

Us IT people are quite likely to be targets given that the chances are we own a lot more technology in our homes, already there have been incidences of burglaries, where Facebook was used to scope out someone and when they were not in their house, we are talking not hackers, but any average thug who can use a browser who could have an anonymous Facebook profile, add you and make you his next target.

Long before social networking, about 7 years ago, a friend of mine with is own IT business he runs from home was the victim of a serious armed robbery in which was taken by two masked individuals in his own car, he had a sharp object put against his neck, maybe a knife but might of only been a screwdrivers, but had a lot of IT equipment taken from his house.   They drove him in his own car to a cashpoint and made him take money, and left him out in his own street, gone with car, IT stuff and cash.   I don’t know where they found out his address, but the chances of this kind of thing happening again I fear could be more frequent.

I use my Gmail profile to share pinpoints of locations both the UK and Israel.   You can have several sets of groups, the UK ones I used to share locations of the hospitals buildings I worked in Southampton, these were not available publicly only to some of rest of the team I worked with, this was not their IT dept’s official policy, its just something I used to make working easier especially as I was not familiar with Southampton and it meant finding and driving to sites easier.   The ones I have here in Israel I also keep private, just ocassionally share with friends when they want to come round and need to find my house.

I am all for sharing experiences of where I have been to and hearing from friends trips, but isn’t it time just to get sensible with how much we share?

Sep 30 2010

The rise and fall and rise of David Icke

Sports journalist David Icke, come self-proclaimed messiah, now more recently conspiracy enthusiast seems to have made a come back in recent times.

Where as Youtube has been the staple diet of the conspiracy nut’s content, its like Icke and co, combine all the most popular elements usual plots like 9/11 was an inside job and Zionists control everything, UFOs, secret AIDS and cancer cures are withheld from the general public, and thousands of other offensive stuff.   Its not like DI has really much new original material.   Maybe its a kind of conspiracy ‘greatest hits’ album.

Either way stuff of the Royal Family being alien lizards make even the Scientologists look tame.

His wiki article makes interesting reading.   Here’s his web site www.davidicke.com Please take with a huge pinch of massive truck load of salt .

His Facebook fan site has 58,000+ followers.

Are people unaware of his famous line of being the son of the God on the Wogan show in the 90s (Youtube) and other antics that show he is completely crackers?   Or do people read his stuff and buy his books for comedy value?

Sep 30 2010

“Dude you have no books to burn” – Ordinary folk tackling extremism

After the horrible book barbeque incident that was the pastor from Florida, who wanted to have a Koran burning party.   See previous post. There was something funny in the news about a church with a copycat type stunt.

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/09/12/skateboarder-extremist-burning-quran/

On this occasion a young lad on a skateboard went past him and snatched the petrol soaked Islamic book from his hand and said ‘Dude! you have no Koran!”   News of this chap hit the blog/twitter community as a hero, that averted a PR disaster in the church and a possible revenge attack that would inevitably happen in Islamic countries towards smaller Christian communities.

I also give this young man (who is an atheist by the way)  a big thumbs up for his actions to avoid a conflict.

One thing I was wondering, when people here in the UK, say things about England, America, Israel, God (the Christian/Jewish one of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) and Jesus, would anyone be brave enough to challenge these people in the high street in a equally fun jovial sort of way?

Sep 23 2010

Wasteland in the Armenian quarter inside Jerusalem’s old city walls

Before Yom Kippur I went walking on some walls with John on the old city again.  You get to peek into the yards of Christian, Jewish and Arab people’s houses.  For obvious reasons its not possible to go completely 360 degrees around because of the Al Asqa mosque is at the back and this part of the wall is not open there.

Still I got to see a few more things I had not previously seen.

Peaking over this side, this is the back of police station, there is a few horses with stable and exercise yard.

This is interesting.   This is a panaromic shot, so these two walls actually join at a right angle where I am standing.   This is the Armenian quarter of the old city.  Ahead is the Armenian church and a car park, but lots of scruffy looking ground just going to waste.   I thought this is odd as surely land within the old city must be very expensive and sort after, must be worth a million dollars maybe.  I guess even a small square of land big enough to put an ice cream kiosk would be expensive to rent.  Its blacked by fire as it appears someone has burnt all the weeds that are growing here.    A hotel or some nice flats could maybe be built here.   Some people who were with me on the tour think that its inevitable if you dug up this ground there would be plenty of archeology here.  For some reason the Armenians would rather let the ground go to waste than sell it, or have it landscaped or develop something on it.

Sep 20 2010

Odd tat for sale in markets in Jerusalem

This ex-Army and outdoor store has various odd things for sale in the this glass cabinet, but one thing caught my eye.

Apologies for the pic being shaky.   Apparently this is a stun gun, in James Bond style its disguised as a popular model Nokia phone.   I didn’t ask the man on the counter if a licence is needed for this kind of thing.

The old British favourite Marmite, can be bought specially imported, albeit with a Hebrew label slapped on.   Its kosher and vegetarian after all.   Its a bit pricey at 30 Shekels (About a fiver for a small jar) though.

A lot of computer and stationary shops sell stickers for your keyboard, some laptops and PC keyboards are available with local keyboard type (plain Hebrew, Hebrew and Arabic or Hebrew and Russian)   if not, you can get stickers to put on.  These Hebrew keyboard stickers are aimed at teenage girls.

The local quack in the Arab market has these magical tea bags that cure everything.  As well these in the pic there are plenty of more boxes for every ailment you can think of.