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I’ve created a new set called ‘views from a plane’ on Flickr as I saw some interesting stuff when I last visited Australia. Here are some of the pictures (more to come). Set link is here.

This is a bit of a weird one. Currently I’m sitting on the upper deck (business) of a 747, awaiting takeoff to LAX, leeching the wifi signal from the Auckland international airport terminal.

An explanation.

Just under two weeks ago I got asked if I would like to fly to Australia for a work trip, helping the customer in Melbourne with testing of one of our new products. I had two days to prepare everything, and I spent a pretty hectic week in Melbourne with work related stuff. I was in Adelaide for about a day total and spent a couple of days back in rural SA catching up with family members. My brother and I staged quite a surprise for mum, thank God she’s still around, we thought we’d nearly sent her to an early grave there for a while. I’ll just say that she wasn’t expecting either of us there when she walked into the kitchen.

I caught up with some people back in Oz, but not nearly as many as I wanted, as is always the case (really, I was only in Adelaide for a day). Some people I didn’t catch up with I’ll be seeing later this year anyway, and you know who you are.

There is only one bad thing about this whole trip: how the hell am I ever going to fly economy ever again after this excellent treatment? :-p

P.S. I must learn to say ‘no’ more often to ‘would you like more wine?’

P.P.S. Also, it’s not like I spent a large amount of time in NZ… all of about 2 hours I think.

I took this HDR picture of Miami the other night. It’s a few pictures taken at different exposures slapped together with photoshop. I ended up forgetting that each photo taken for a HDR really should be one-stop different from its ‘neighbour’, and the highest exposure photo wasn’t nearly enough to bring out the reflection in the water. Also, I was in the sort of spot where I didn’t feel completely safe, so I didn’t hang around for too long.

Is that enough excuses yet?

Note this is a very small snippet of the Miami skyline. It’s a lot larger than this and is due to get a *lot* larger than it is now. Count the number of cranes in this picture. I think there are something like ten of them.

Click on the pic to access the larger versions.

I am a massive, massive fan of the BBC car show “Top Gear”. The trio of presenters work just so well together and make it absolutely hilarious to watch. Frosty (who at one time maintained his blog!) used to have screenings during work back in Adelaide, something I always looked forward to.

Richard Hammond, one of the presenters, was recently in a car crash while trying to beat the British land speed record. I’m not surprised at that, I’m surprised he actually got injured (and pretty badly too). Here’s hoping he recovers soon!

Story is here.