Jeff’s Jottings

Work was just clearing out some old promotional merchandise and for a gold coin donation, you could pick up whatever you want. This is what I raked in:

Don’t know why I got so many lanyards. Maybe I’ll build a collection or something. And the thing under the ‘3 fest’ notepads is a pair of corporate pants. Fits nicely too. Sccccooorrre!

From the one and only known asian grocery store in St Leonards:

Wit Oriental - Hehe

$1.50 from Tonyon supermarket

Tonight was the annual Catalyst end of financial year dinner/trivia at the Crows Nest Hotel. I thought the $21.50 chicken parmigiana was a disappointment and in terms of trivia, we were cruising after round 1, within striking distance after round 2 but faded in round 3 to finish just outside the top 3 out of about a dozen teams. Once again, there was a question on the Bible, just like last year! The question was “In the Old Testament, where did Moses send spies out to explore the land?” Good to see the Bible’s getting exposure at the local pub

Also, something interesting happened during the middle of Round 1 that got me thinking. The MC invited people to come up with the worst Michael Jackson jokes to win some free drinks. Some people came up with real nasty ones that got the whole place cringing as well as cracking up. But I wonder how many of these people kicked up a stink with the Chaser’s ‘Maker a wish’ skit a few weeks ago.

So where do you draw the line between what is funny and what is distasteful?

Last year I bought a Western Digital external hard drive (Elements 320GB) for data backup purposes and a couple of months ago, the power supply unit crapped itself and died. Apparently the dying PSU issue is VERY common so do yourself a favour and stay away from this model (but Western Digital is generally pretty good).

Did a bit of research online and found out you can buy a new enclosure (comes with a new PSU) and swap out the hard drive. So I went to ARC computers on Thursday and got myself one for under $50 - Vantec Nexstar CX:

Below are some pics of the swapover:

Left: the hard drive in the old WD enclosure

Right: the new enclosure

The back panel of the Vantec enclosure. There is a on/off switch!

The finished product in operation. The blue LED light is crazily bright.

So what to do with the old enclosure? Don’t know yet but an early idea would be to put my Bible in it. It won’t keep the water out 100% due to the USB/Power/Air holes but will protect it from the wear and tear: