I’ve just spent the last two hours upgrading to the new WordPress version 1.5 I had never intended on doing so, I was just going to do a complete re-install to clean up a lot of the loopholes that was happening with the multiple anti comment-spam solutions that I’ve got. Alas I noticed that 1.5 had been released so I went for it.

So now I have 1.5, a good blacklisting system and everything is tidy once more. I’ve rebuilt the theme from scratch, so hopefully all will now be well

When I was a kid, I’d go to Auckland maybe 4 times a year, so on this trip I expected nothing special. The problem was that whenever I went to Auckland as a kid, I was more often than not on the North Shore.

When I arrived in Auckland, I was amazed at the new Britomart Station, and thought I’d stop to snap some pictures for my architect friends. But as I reached down to my bag to grab out my digicam, I heard some heavy breathing and the words “nice arse big boy.” I slowly turned to see the tallest transvestite in history. He/she/it was a tower of biblical proportions. Fuck, I wasnt sticking around. Exit – Stage left.

I escaped Britomart fairly quickly only to be almost hit by some jackoff who was driving half on the road and half on the footpath. I imagined a 6 year old me in my head going “I WANNA GO HOME! I WANT MY MUMMY!” but I gained my composure and dived into the nearest taxi. Exit – Stage as fast the fuck away as possible.

I arrived at Columbard and was processed and given my keys and swipe card. In my room I was safe and secure and had a view across to an apartment block where a group of semi-naked women were just hanging out in the Auckland humidity. And I thought that only happened on those pathetic-yet-pleasing Glasson’s ads

Our office up in Auckland rocks, and a few of my workmates tried to convince me to move to Auckland. I’ve got to say, it’s appealing…

I then caught up with as much family as I could, and that was good. The females in the family were obsessed with whether or not I have a girlfriend (probably just wanting to make sure I breed with someone of good stock, or asking a loaded question to see if I’m gay or not, I dont want to overanalyse it) and the males in the family were obsessed with offering me beer.

All in all I had a great time in Auckland, and I want to go back more often. It was awesome getting a change of scenery for the first time in about 3 years.

So here I am in humid Auckland, sitting in my tenth floor sleeping studio ™ at Columbard

So anyway, some pics of my sleeping studio ™

A shot from the bathroom looking through the entrance/kitchen towards the bed and desk

Some storage and electronics, skyTV, DVD player and a stereo

The bathroom. Hidden behind the door is a combo washing machine/dryer. The shower rocks! It’s like standing under a firehose

So I’m writing this from my room at Waikato University, where I am staying for the next three days for the NZNOG. On friday I’m jumping on a train and heading north to Auckland where I will stay for another week. So currently some pictures of my room:

Enough space to do what you need to do

The first problem however is that the first floor (which we have been assigned to) is not wired, so the lounge at one end of the very long floor is setup with an archaic hub and a wap11. I can pick up the stray packet or two from my room, and I have a 7dBi antenna! So Techie has dug out a WRT54GS, and we’ve set that up in the hallway with a couple of network cables running back to the hub. Now we can both get great connections in our respective rooms, and we’re spreading the service to more of our fellow conference goers at the same time

Well, that’s this update done. I have to get up in approx 6 hours for breakfast and the first workshop, TRANGO technology