IR Rallies, Ars Magica, Cisco, phpWebsite, Australian Noir, Indian Cyberpunk

Some 500,000 people protested against the IR legislation last week including an estimated 175,000 in Melbourne. John Howard shrugs it off; and he'll be able to as well, as long as the rally doesn't translate into a campaign of industrial action. That's the political reality of the situation. Governments can ignore protests of millions if they simply go back to work afterwards.

Last Tuesday played Ars Magica with caseopaya, Wilf and jimboboz as GM. for the first time having wanted to play for many, many years. Setting is wonderful, magic system is interesting, characterisation (mage, companions and grogs) is interesting, but character generation sucks time like a psychic vampire. I've had a rant on how much it sucks here.

Following evening sat three CCNA module tests with minimal study. My grades were 95.7% (TCP/IP Error Messages), 77.2% (Router Troubleshooting) and 98.0% (Intermediate TCP/IP). I think I know where my weak spots are! This week is the final lab test for semester two. I'll be spending the next couple of days with my nose buried in books, methinks.

Spent a couple of days testing bits and pieces of phpWebsite after caseopaya's work seem to think that it's about time they received some decent return on their IT budget (quelle surprise!). I'd probably prefer Zope/Plone, but as part of the standard set of CPanel add-ons phpWebsite is pretty damn good.

A fair chunk of Saturday was spent helping severina_242 and _zombiemonkey move into their new townhouse (white! glass bricks!). cvisors was there as well and much fun and unpacking was had along with beer and pizza.

Sunday had Jess Permezel from the Council of Single Mothers; I gave the service, citing a the distinction between family arrangements and caring parents from a UU sermon by a retired professor, the UUA's GA resolutions on the matter in the U.S. as the reading, and a choice quote from Dickens as the closing words. The government's "work to welfare" program is really going to harm these people and those associated with them. Afterwards had to sit through the frustration of a three hour committee meeting. Really not good enough.

Fortunately Michael Cole saved the day with an excellent Australian Noir game session. There are Deep Ones in Hastings, didn't you know? Well, I always suspected it was the case. We were also joined by antayla, whom caseopaya and I dined afterwards. Great night.

Currently working my way through Ian McDonald's "River of Gods" for valeskah1. It's Indian cyberpunk and written in that style (fast and dense); I'm enjoying it a great deal.