Software developer and student from Melbourne, Australia
As part of the Metro Tunnel project, the railway junction on the approach to South Yarra station is being redeveloped to accommodate the new tunnel portal. Whilst this much is obvious, what isn’t immediately clear is the purpose of all that work that’s going between the Caulfield and Sandringham lines.
To all my readers, Merry Christmas and happy holidays! It’s been a very challenging year, especially for us here in Melbourne where many of us were confined to our homes. I’m hoping for 2022 to be a much more productive year for myself, and hopefully in the process I’ll be writing a lot more about that journey here.
Wherever you are, I hope you all have a safe and happy time, whether it be with family, friends, or your community. Onwards towards 2022!
–Nick.
Hi all – it’s been while, hasn’t it? Since we last spoke, I’ve made another revolution on the computing merry-go-round, finding myself using my old 2015 MacBook Pro again. Amongst other reasons, I’m (again) seeking simplicity in my computing, with the aim of being able to focus more on what really matters in life. And with that, out goes Windows, and in comes macOS. To be honest, it feels like I never left – this is a good thing.
Following this philosophy, I took a look at the blogging situation. To be honest, blogging felt like a chore; my last post was over a year ago. How can I make this easier for myself, hopefully to entice myself to blog more? Firstly, I’d like an app to blog, a dedicated editor in which to author my posts (Open Live Writer doesn’t exist on macOS). And secondly, I’d like to move away from static site blogging–as much as I appreciate the flexibility and customisability–running a git push every time I wanted to publish a post felt like setting the barrier too high. So the answer was simple in this case, find a hosted blogging service that doesn’t suck (WordPress.com) and an app to publish to it (MarsEdit 4.) And so far, so good.
Switching back to Mac has also caused me to pick up some new productivity tools, which have had a major positive improvement on my workflows and productivity levels. I stumbled across OmniFocus whilst browsing the App Store one evening, and before I knew it I had ordered a copy of David Allen’s Getting Things Done off of Amazon. Just a few days ago I finished reading it, and I hope to blog soon about it. It’s been immensely helpful with getting my education, work, and other projects in order, and with focusing adequate time on each without worrying about the ‘other things I should be doing’. Overall, it was a very good read–one I can see myself coming back to every view months.
Tonight, Monday the 30th of September, will be the very last evening one can dial ‘1194’ or ‘1196’ from any Australian mobile or landline phone to receive the current time read continuously, or a spoken weather forecast for their nearest major capital city, respectively. Dial either of these numbers, and you would’ve heard an old-timely British male broadcaster voice that easily sounded like it could’ve been recorded in the 1950s or 60s. You can see below a video of both numbers in action on their last day of operation, recorded by ThebusofdoomFSX on YouTube.
Continue reading “The last day of the 1194 time service and 1196 weather service”
Nick Vella 