I have just created a new section on the site: Political Profile.

This is something that I have been thinking about and planning for a while.

Political parties have their list of policies and views on things. So why can’t an individual?

I would be interested to see more people think about their political views, or even post them online.

It would be interesting to compare them and also see how they align with various political parties.

Now there is nothing much on my political profile at the moment. It is still under construction. But I will be adding to it in the near future.

Now there is absolutely no denying that the storm that has hit us during the last two days has been particularly nasty, however, one thing that is getting to me is the way the media blow it up, and the way in which the general public then go into panic mode. I had a friend telling me that the motorway was closed and they shouldn’t be driving because there are slips and stuff. The irony here is that the motorway was never closed and the person couldn’t explain to me how you could get a slip in the middle of central Auckland where there are no hills to slip.

Coming back to the one in 10 year storm idea. Compare these two police media release pages. The first is for yesterday. The second is for July 10 2007. One year ago. Where we got hit by a very similar storm which took out power up here for two days. 48 hours. Not 3. And that was a year ago, not 10.

26 July 2008:

10 July 2007:

At first I was laughing at this press release by the NZ Police which was released in the middle of yesterday’s storm.

***Urgent Media Release***

There have been reports in the Media about the evacuation of Whangaparaoa.

There is NO Evacuation of Whanagaparaoa.

However, I think I may have no have worked out where the confussion arised from. At 10.30am the Whakapapa Ski Field at Ruapehu was evacuated due to the storm. Reading more about it you can see why:

Between 10am and 10:40am the wind speed went from 0 to 100kph and it’s now sitting at over 200kph. Our extremely hardy road crew are currently out being blasted by wind and snow as they fit chains onto all vehicles to get the public safely down the road.

Now I can imagine that the media would of probably just confussed the word Whakapapa with the word Whangarparaoa quite easily. One is a ski field on Ruapehu which often gets hits by snow storms. The other is a peninsula north of Auckland with lots of homes on it. Given the storm would of been bad at both areas a mix up in words is not supprising at all.

I will do a full blog post after the storm.

But nothing that exciting to report.

Given that this is meant to be the worse storm in years it seems very similar to this post from february this year (5 months ago, not years): http://www.brad.net.nz/blog/2008/02/the-flooded-garden/

Update #1: Okay we can now call this storm a real storm. Power cut out at around 3.50pm this afternoon. Came back on at 6.45pm which meant I missed the news. Grr.

I listened to the 5 and 6 o’clock newstalkzb radio updates. First there were 35,000 and then at 6pm 53,000 homes in northern Auckland without power. At the time they stated that any above ground power cuts would not be fixed today as it was dangerous. So I was presently surprised when the power came back on at 6.45pm.

The eye of the storm crossed Albany at around 5.50pm and it was indeed a sight to behold. Not as impressive as you see in the movies, however, you could still see the wall of storm cloud and clearish skies directly above you with no wind or rain for about 15 or so minutes. Quite cool really.

Note to self: Make sure you have candles, fresh torch batteries and gas for gas cooker ready for next storm. I had a cousin drop off candles and batterys but tonights dinner was cold. Thank God for canned fish. I had a milo the instant the power came back on.

Power restored over networks

Date: 26-07-2008
Updated at 6:45pm.
The following areas have had power restored throughout the day. There still may be pockets of no power remaining due to further network damage and damaged customer owned service lines. Our crews will continue to work throughout the night and tomorrow to restore power.

Atkinson Rd, Belmont, Browns Bay, Coatesville, Helensville, Henderson Valley, Howick, Laingholm, Mangere East, Manly, Manukau, Maraetai, Northern, Papakura, Riverhead, Snells Beach, Spur Road, Swanson, Takanini, Torbay, Parts of Waiheke, Waimauku, Warkworth, Wellsford, Woodford Ave,

Update #2: Well the power came back on and then about an hour and a half later my Internet connection died. I can’t win. It has finally come back on, 15 hours after it went out. Grrr. Anyway storm is over now. I will post full analysis soon.

Customers may experience intermittent disruption of Wireless connectivity in Auckland (Albany, North Harbour, Rosedale) between Saturday, 26 July 2008 8:30 p.m. and Sunday, 27 July 2008 11:05 a.m.. Engineers are working to resolve this issue. Woosh Wireless apologises for any inconvenience caused and thank you in advance for your co-operation.

I have just been advised that the inspirational author of “The Last Lecture” and Computer Science Professor passed away earlier this morning.

He lived longer then he was expected to and now he is in a better place. RIP.

This weekend the U.S. Seceraty of State is visiting NZ. It is truely an honour for this country to be hosting such an important dipomat.

Unfortunately AUSA (the students’ association at Auckland University) have issued a media released advising that it is offering a $5000 reward to any student who citizen’s arrest Mrs Rice.

The key reasoning for this is the war in Iraq. In particular the fact that the USA invaded another country aka interferreed in another countrys politics.

What I find quite ironic here is that by trying to citizen’s arrest Rise the students themselves are interferring in the politics of another country. How bizzaire.

There has been a lot of noise in the media recently about Universal Living Allowances for all students.

I am a strong believer in the fact that you go to University to learn and get an education that will better you and the country. I do not believe that you should have to distract yourself away from studies to do part time work to support yourself financially. If the Government wants an knowledge economy of the future they must first fund it.

What I propose is a Universal Living Allowance for all fulltime students as follows:

• To qualify you must be enrolled as a fulltime student in a course with a minimum length of 6 months.
• The student allowance rate should be set at the same amount as the dole.
• Once you have completed your first year on the USL you can only qualify for subsequent years if and only if you pass 75% of your papers in your previous years.
• USL should only be available to undergraduate and honours students. Any research driven post-graduate qualifications should be paid for through scholarships.
• Only University and Polytech students in a recognised post-secondary course should be eligible.

Now I have no idea of how much this would cost. But this is what this country needs. Hand ups to those who deserve it, not hand outs to those that don’t.

Why do people insist on using Windows Live Messenger and then when you talk to them they say they are busy. Well if you are busy then why are you on Messenger in the first place? Obvious you don’t want people to distract or talk to you so why then do you make the consciencous decision to log into a communication device? I just don’t get it.

Messenger should have three modes: Online, Online but away (aka brb/I’m making a milo), and appear offline (for people like me who use MSN at work or are genuinely working but keeping an eye out for discussions to be had).

Get rid of this online but busy stupidity.