Crazy cobwebs

From SMH.com.au: Massive cobwebs leave scientists baffled.

"Entomologists are debating the origin and rarity of a sprawling spider web that blankets several trees, shrubs and the ground along a 200-yard stretch of trail in a North Texas park..." read more

Australian citizenship test

Sample questions from the Australian citizenship test.

I passed. Did you?

In case you're curious, here's some more info about citizenship and the test.

You know technology is part of your life...

Found this online. You know technology is part of your life when...

1. You accidentally enter your password on the microwave.
   
   
2. You haven't played solitaire with real cards in years.
   
   
3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers to reach your family of three.
   
   
4. You e-mail or IM the person who works at the desk next to you.
   
   
5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that they don't have e-mail addresses.
   
   
6. You pull up in your own driveway and use your mobile phone to see if anyone is home to help you carry in the groceries.
   
   
7. Every commercial on television has a web site at the bottom of the screen.
   
   
8. Leaving the house without your mobile phone, which you didn't have the first 20 or 30 (or 60) years of your life, is now a cause for panic and you turn around to go and get it.
   
   
9. You get up in the morning and go online before getting your coffee.
   
   
10. You start tilting your head sideways to smile. : )
    
    
11. You're reading this and nodding and laughing.
    
    
12. Even worse, you know exactly to whom you are going to forward this message.

Here's are some more I'd like to add...

1. You set up an email address for your cat.
   
   
2. You set up a blog for your cat.
   
   
3. Your cat gets more blog comments in one month than you do in a whole year.

Hmmm... don't know if those last few are about technology being part of your life, or about being too obsessed by cats. Probably both. Hmmm.

PDAdb.net

Found this useful PDA database: PDAdb.net. Looks very handy. Found it while researching as I'm currently in the market for two new devices: a PDA/smartphone, and a GPS.

Brian Bay? Almond Land? Drunk Island?

Tourism website wotif.com have compiled a list of funny misspellings used in their search tool for some popular Australian destinations. Well, some of these destinations are popular (e.g. Byron, Uluru, Cairns), I'd argue that some are not quite so popular! (e.g. Wagga? Dubbo?)

1. Brian Bay (Byron Bay)
   
   
2. The Big Red Rock (Uluru)
   
   
3. Cans (Cairns)
   
   
4. Clowndra (Caloundra)
   
   
5. Dumbo (Dubbo)
   
   
6. Wogga Wogga (Wagga Wagga)
   
   
7. Erinsborough and Summer Bay (fictional locations from Neighbours and Home & Away)
   
   
8. Almond Land (Arnhem Land)
   
   
9. Drunk Island (Dunk Island)
   
   
10. Permission Beach (Mission Beach)

Brrm, brrrm, brrrrrrrm!

The most exciting news of the weekend is that we bought a car!


It's got some fun stuff that we've never had in our other cars, including a sun roof and seat warmers! Something it doesn't have is an automatic transmission. Peter much prefers manual cars, and I always preferred them in Australia too. However, when we've hired cars over here, they've always been automatics, so I was kinda getting used to automatics. Apparently most people over here buy automatic cars.


The prerequisite to all this is that we had to get local driver's licences, or 'licenses' as they would spell it here. In some countries (e.g. the UK) and in some parts of the US, they let Australians swap over their Australian driver's licence for an American one. This is a state-by-state issue, and in Virginia you can't just swap over. So we had to go through the whole process, e.g. road sign test, knowledge test, driving test, etc.

Lima restaurant

We went to Lima Restaurant tonight. They were extending their DC restaurant week menu, which we sampled last night.

The Open Table website describes Lima's cuisine as 'Latin American, Fusion/Eclectic'. This sounded promising as I usually like anything that's 'eclectic' and/or 'fusion'. The food was very good, and so was the ambience and the service, but I have to admit that I do prefer Asian Fusion/Eclectic.

Driving on the left or the right

Found this interesting Wikipedia article about driving on the left or right side of the road. According to Wikipedia...

"About 34% of the world by population drive on the left, and 66% on the right. By roadway distances, about 28% drive on the left, and 72% on the right, even though originally most traffic drove on the left worldwide."

I was fairly sure we were in the minority in Australia, driving on the left. I knew they also drove on the left in the UK, New Zealand and South Africa, but I assumed that pretty much everywhere else in the world drove on the right.

Turns out that there are many other parts of the world who drive on the left, including Japan, India, Hong Kong, parts of south east Asia, parts of south eastern Africa, and some Pacific countries. I also learned that some countries have switched their side of the road over time. Interesting.

Go here to see a list of countries who drive on the left, and here to see a list of countries who drive on the right.

Nora is at it again!

Nora's first performance is available here. How awesome is this kitty??

Nora now has a website, and a CD too! And you can go here to read Nora's story.