Brian Hoover's Blog

So we took the kids fishing down at the inlet again on the weekend. We didn’t really expect to catch anything. It was more an exercise in keeping the kids occupied and killing time until dinner. Jett managed to catch a nice sized fish of some description. Ashton felt a bit inadequate with her Blowfish. Those little buggers have strong mouths and jaws; they just don’t want to let go of a hook.

There’s also a picture of a Cat Haven vehicle which took my fancy. We saw this at the Mandurah Crab Festival we visited earlier in the day.

So Ashton has been experiencing headaches lately, so Suzanne decided to take her to an optometrist to get her eyes checked. Turns out she needs glasses as she was struggling to read the letters and words on one of those boards. It took about a week and a half from the time we ordered them to the time the were delivered. Ashton says she “kind of” likes her glasses. She chose pink color with elephants because they looked very cute. She’s the only one with glasses in her class, and most of the other kids like her too. But one girl said some things which upset Ashton a bit, but we spoke about it as a family and she feels a bit better. She says they have really helped. She wears them only when reading, and we have stressed how valuable (read as costly) and important they are, and that it’s a great responsibility we’ve given to her to look after them. She diligently polishes them and puts them in their case, but she sometimes forgets where she puts the case. We hope she gets the hang of it all soon, and that her headaches subside. She enjoys reading and learning, and it’d be sad if she avoided doing these because of something simple like bad eyes.

Ashton has glasses. More pics and thoughts later.

Suzanne is now a blogger. I hope she keeps it up. She’s done well for her first day!

So I’ve found a good way to remember when my kids were born, and my wife’s birthday. Suzanne and I met in 1999, the same year Star Wars Episode 1 was released. Ashton was born in 2002, same year as Star Wars Episode 2. Jett was born in 2005, same year as Star Wars Episode 3. Not only that, but Suzanne’s birthday is the day after Star Wars Day. Am I a complete nerd or what?

During the middle of last week I revisited a site I haven’t browsed to in a while. Heavens-above.com can be used to, among other things, determine when the International Space Station is visible in your part of the world. You plug in your lat and long (or choose your city from a menu) and the site will tell you when you can see the ISS float by with tables showing the time, the direction, the azimuth etc. I used to do this more often a few years ago; I’d grab Suzanne and we’d rush outside and watch this bright dot go overhead. I’d marvel, and Suzanne would pretend to be interested. It was more interesting to watch it magically appear or disappear in the middle of the sky as it came out of or went into the Earths shadow. I also used this site to predict Iridium flares which are awesome. Should do this again sometime…

Anyhow, this week I saw that on Friday night it’d be visible for a good 10 minutes going from horizon to horizon with a maximum altitude of 60-odd degrees (not too bad on the neck muscles) and an amazing magnitude of -3.2. Very bright indeed.

So, when I got home Friday night I had about an hour to give Jett and Ashton a quick lesson in orbital mechanics and an even quicker history on the construction of the ISS. I’m pretty sure they got the gist of it all; that the ISS goes around the Earth, it’s a joint project between the Russian, American and European space agencies, that it needs to be around dawn or dusk if you want to see it etc.

So, with that in mind I thought we’d bring up NASAs own tracking map so we could see exactly where it was, and so we could run outside at the right time, but unfortunately that map is turned out to be hopelessly inaccurate at the time. Not sure why, maybe it misread the time/timezone from my system clock but it seemed to be way out. So we made do with the map at Heavens-Above.com which was fine. We saw that it was flying right over London, England and its path would bring it over Perth via India all in about 35 minutes. Pretty fast!

So, at the appointed time which turned out to be about 5 past 8 we wandered outside and turned it into a competition to find the space station first. It wasn’t hard. We all knew it was coming from the north-east. When it came it was easily the brightest thing in the sky besides the moon. Ashton asked me if I was really serious about Sirius being the brightest star. Haw Haw.

So, yeah we watched it for a few minutes. A silent, bright light floating by. I think Ashton lost interest pretty quickly but Jett stayed the whole time.

The thing is, for the rest of the night and for most of the next day Jett would ask, “Dad, where is the space station now?” and he’d demand to get back into the computer to use the “space map” to find it. This would happen about every half hour. Once he found out where it was, he’d run around the house and give status updates to Suzanne and Ashton. “Mum, it’s over Japan now!” He asked me to find pictures and the names of the current crew too. I wonder why this has captured his imagination so much? And I wonder how long it will last.

Next weekend I plan on breaking out the old telescope and pointing it at Mars which is currently close to opposition. Moons’s a bit bright now, so we’ll wait a week.

I’ve always loved Hummers, especially the first 1992 civilian release of the original military model. It was big, boofy, chunky and said “Don’t mess with me”. I’m not that much of a fan of the H2, and the H3 not cool at all; I would rather push my Toyota than drive an H3. I’ve bought a small collection of Hot Wheels Hummer which Jett has taken over, and I realise that this is the closest I will ever get to owning the real thing.

From the first time I saw it I thought that it’d make a killer limousine. I started seeing them on TV in around 1995, and I thought that if I could get one out here to Perth it’d make a great business and make me oodles of money. Unfortunately I was never in a position to get the idea off the ground. Still I think it took to about 2004 before I first saw a stretch Hummer limo on Perth roads.

Suzanne made me  insanely jealous a few weeks ago when her school-mum friends got together as a going-away party night activity when ours and another family left our old suburb. She lauded it over me, too. “Guess where I am?” she texted. And every time we’d see a Hummer on the road after that she’d casually mention “I’ve ridden in one of those, you know”.

But, this ride of hers planted the seed of an idea in her mind. This would make a great 40th birthday present for me. I have an aversion to parties and such, especially those in my honour, so this would be a good low-key affair. It took a few weeks of meticulous planning in secret to pull this off without me knowing. And I am so impressed that neither of our kids divulged the secret. I knew something was up about a week ago, but Suzanne made me promise not to pump them for information. I’m pretty sure I could have made them crack, but I was a good sport and didn’t really apply myself.

So we turned up at her parents place and I find a bunch of family there too. OK, good. I knew this much already. Actually, a few things were going through my mind on the way there… perhaps it was a bungy jump; I even thought she might have somehow gotten me onto the show “Wipeout“, but they probably don’t film in Perth.

Anyhow, the limo pulled up and I must say I was really surprised and happy we drove around Fremantle and Perth eating sushi and listening to cheesy rock music videos. See the photos below

Rather than a bunch of smaller presents each, Santa bought us one big “family present” for Christmas. He got us an extra set of controllers with Nun-Chucks, and set of Wii Remote Plus. He even managed to slip in the Wii Fit Plus package which he must have known Suzanne really desired.

After opening the boxes on Christmas morning we fired it up to test it out. I did a quick RTFM, but in the end I didn’t really need to. The system is easy to set up and configure. All I really needed to know were some technical details like the range of the controllers so that we didn’t stand too far back.

We were presented with the Wii menu. From here we could play a game, connect to a network for updates and internet browsing, or adjust the settings like date/time and location. These configurations were all easily found, changed and saved. Connecting to the WiFi network was as easy as supplying the passphrase. We don’t intend to do a lot of web browsing on this, but hey… it’s handy for system updates and adding Wii “channels”.

We found navigating with the Wii Remotes to be an easy learning curve; simple and intuitive. I’ve never owned any other form of Nintendo game so I thought it might be a chore to learn the buttons but it wasn’t difficult at all.

So after familiarising ourselves with the controls we thought we’d put it to use and play some games. First up was Wii Sports, the default game included in the packaging which is a collection of 6-8 games like Tennis, Bowling, Boxing and a few others. It took us a few minutes each to learn each game, but that’s to be expected from something completely new.

The next game was Wii Sports Resort, which is a collection of about 20 mini-games plus a plug-in to the Wii Controller which makes the controller more sensitive and precise. This sensitivity is needed for almost all the games like Golf, Frisbee, Sword Fighting, Basketball and Archery. You eventually learn that you get rated on each performance with points. Once you reach 1000 points you become a “Pro”. There’s also a handful of “stamps”, another form of reward for “achievements”. So far I’m a pro on Sword Fighting and Archery.

The Wii-Fit bundle includes the Wii-Fit Board which enhances the Wii-Fit game. It’s a balance board which is remarkably sensitive to the slightest shift in weight. Using the Yoga section of Wii-Fit showed me that I have absolutely no balance. The Wii-Fit Board can also be used with other games such as Raving Rabbids, which my mum had coincidentally given to us as a Christmas gift. It opens up new possibilities in the game such as sitting down on the board and using it as a sled, or standing on it sideways to use it as an interplanetary surf board. It’s great fun.

I have found, however, that we have been putting in more time on the Wii that I would like. Sure it’s Christmas, it’s school holidays and it’s the new novelty but I was surprised to find that we had logged an average of more than 6 hours a day on it, actively playing games. This week we had our first Wii-free day and we intend to ration out trigger time from now on. I think the kids can play as much Wii-fit as they want as that will help with balance, strength and general fitness. But other games should be doled out in small amounts. Hopefully the novelty will wear off, but not too much. It’s a fun system, and some games like Wii-Fit can be a great benefit if used properly.

So I’m 40 today. I don’t want to make a big deal of it, but I’m sure Suzanne has something planned. Pretty sure we’re going to the local pub tonight for a pizza dinner, which is about as elaborate a party as I want. I’ve already got some well wishes from facebook and, as always, the guys at potf2.com.

It’s just another day, but I suppose it’s a milestone of sorts. I’m officially old now. But at least Ashton reassures me that I’m not really old. I guess to a seven year old child you’re only old when you are hunched over with wrinkles and coke bottle glasses.

40 turns up a lot in scripture and is commonly found as a measurement as some substantial amount of time for endurance or preparation: it rained for 40 days and nights during the flood. Moses spent 40 years shepherding his people in the wilderness, and also spent 40 days up Mt Sinai (twice!). King David ruled for 40 years, as did Solomon.  Elijah fasted for 40 days in the wilderness, as did the Saviour.

So with 40 being a theme of time and preparation I can say I’m fairly excited about whatever is to come in the rest of my life. I guess. I dunno. It will all sink in when I need to choose “40 or over” instead of “39 and under” in online surveys. Also I need to plan to get my motorcycle license, and have an affair with my hot, blonde 19 year old secretary.

So I had the last week off work. I had to work New Years day which was tediously boring, even though there was an active Known Issue alert which affected only West Australian customers which had to do with WA no longer observing Daylight Savings Time. The code works fine if you’re north of the equator or if you always observe DST, but since WA is south and we only trialled DST for three years we found there’s a bug when you change calendar years.

But it was all a non-event and I came through unscathed so after catching the train back to Mandurah we drove down to Dunsborough to visit my parents. Natalie and Dave were there which was cool too. Some of the highlights were playing golf at Simmo’s, and watching Star Trek on the large theatre screen. I doubt mum has ever seen TNG or DS9. She remembers the old series so seeing the familiar characters was a kick for her. My old nemesis Eric Bana was even in it. At Simmo’s we played a round of mini golf. Somehow Suzanne managed to beat me, but Jett had the best score of all, managing to pull off triple figures! Then we all had ice creams. We didn’t tell the kids that  we had a banana split at Simmo’s while they were out at the movies the day before with my mum watching Alvin and the Chipmunks.

The rest of the time down there was a mix of walking the dogs, hunting for golf balls, swimming down at the beaches at Dunsborough, Yallingup and Meelup. For some reason we didn’t get many photos while we were away.

But, like all good things it came to an end and we had to come home. On Thursday we visited Abingdon Miniature Village which is near us on Pinjarra Road. The grass was manicured to within an inch of it’s life and looked fantastic. It’s quite a surprising little place. I had my reservations about going and seeing some crappy little model houses, but there’s more to it than this. Besides the model houses, there’s a model railway with tunnels and bridges and waterfalls, there’s a nice hedge maze to get lost in, and a smaller “running maze” with no walls for the kids to play on. There was mini golf, a big sand-pit play area, an old heritage Tea Room (way overpriced, so we had McDonalds) and a little boutique. I had a better time than I thought I would have.

On the Friday we had some old-ish new-ish friends for dinner. “Old-ish new-ish?” I hear you ask? They’re kinda old for me and kinda new for Suzanne. I used to go to Church with Adam and Elissa many years ago, but lost touch. I found Adam on facebook a while ago, and our nosey wives also managed to communicate and make friends with each other. They’re on vacation here from their home over east and so we had arranged to meet up mostly so that Suzanne and Elissa could commiserate and comfort each other about having such nerdy, quirky husbands.

Explaining my relationship with Adam is strange… He was (and always has been, funny that) a couple years younger than me so I can’t really remember have that much to do with him in Church when I was young. I do remember, though, that he was into Star Wars when I was also into Star Wars. I can’t remember who invited who, but  I remember attending some Star Wars fan club meeting with him at some school. I think it was in Maylands…? There was munchies and a quiz and talk of collecting and rumours of new movies; I’m pretty sure it was before Return of the Jedi. I remember Elissa and my sister Natalie hit some kind of jackpot one afternoon when they made a call from a public payphone near our Church meeting house in Greenmount. They dropped their coin in and the whole coin box opened up spilling 20s everywhere. I lost contact with both of them for the longest time until about 6 months ago. I remember hearing rumours that he was a Bishop or a Secret Agent or something like that. Adam joined in on a couple of my idiotic facebook status updates, Elissa and Suzanne compared notes on which of us was nerdier.

Anyhow, I was happy to have them and their family over for dinner and take them crabbing. I appreciate that they took a night out of their valuable holiday time to catch up with some guy they haven’t seen or heard from in twenty years and meet his family. Their kids are cool and seemed to be alright playing with mine. Their oldest can even quote Lord of the Rings which ain’t bad. I think they all enjoyed crabbing, which was strictly catch-and-release only. I’d be glad to have them over again so we can compare collections in more detail.

Happy new year everyone. Here’s some pics of us fooling around with sparklers. It’s a balmy 22 degrees Celcius outside, beats the cold temperatures I know most of you guys are enduring right now!