I cannot believe this – how cool

Sometimes one just gets blown away how technology makes life easier!

I have downloaded Air B2 on to my mac. I downloaded the version 2 of beta to enable Airpress.

I had a problem, which was making it easier to interact with my blog on WordPress when I am offline and saving my blogs somewhere other than having them on WordPresss. I now have this cool interface with Airpress to do just that. I haven’t tried all the features just yet but so far I am impressed by the simplicity and the ease with which it installed.

Two things that don’t seem to be quite streamlined yet are when you re-enter it does not download the latest blog – so I ended up creating a second instance of my blog and haven’t found a way to get rid of it. I am also yet to figure out whether it has downloaded more than 20 blogs – I doesn’t look like it. Hmmm

Ah well. In the next few versions I am sure.

Decision made – we’re staying in our paradise

I spoke earlier about our plan to move – or rather cash-in on the hard work on our home of 10 years. Our ask and the buyer dollar just did not match. So we stay.

One thing we learned in the process is that ‘downsizing’ in Sydney is not what it should be. It was really hard to find reasonable parallels at smaller size AND smaller cost.

I think the market is yet to understand the reasonable shift position to attract the numbers to apartments. To change one’s life style, which some view as downsizing, from a highly equipped 4/5 bedroom home to a similarly equipped 3 bedroom apartment [off the plan] costs the same if not more and then the shared living spaces are a lot smaller. Downsize is size but not in dollar. Many of the apartments also come with higher quarterly rates due to pools et al which you may or may not use.

Where we are, a gorgeous area in Sydney, about 15min from the city centre, the homes appreciate on average at about 10% a year, so doubling the value in 7 years or perhaps a little longer. The city apartments are at about 6% [the better areas] appreciation rate. In addition you can keep going by adding value to your home whereas with an apartment you cannot.

It is only in the last 10 years that people are living in the centre of Sydney. It used to be a dead space when I first moved into Sydney in ’88. I could not believe that a city with such a great climate didn’t have very many outdoor cafes. It is getting better, much better.

The life style change will have to wait.

I guess trouble is that the whole system is geared for people to stay in their larger homes and suburbia/family style living. Makes for better citizens. Am I conjuring up conspiracy theories here? Nah, just observing one aspect of how the world works and keeps us perpetually reinforcing the societal means to ‘stabilise’.

The upside is that we get to now relax and enjoy the years of planning and thinking to make this home work great for us.

Packaging frustrations

Symptoms of what problem?

Just in the last few years I have encountered numerous problems with packaging and I do wonder why it is so hard to think it through and make it easy.

1/ Toothpaste is packaged mostly [one major well known brand in Oz anyway] in carton tubes, which hide the look of the tube inside. I cannot stand the tube with the small cap as it is always messy. And I cannot see what sort of tube is inside the packaging. So I chose other brands where I know what I am buying. So draw me a picture…. toothpaste packaging for the dummies…

2/ Headsets and many other things sold at airport electronic goods stores are packaged in heat sealed plastic containers, which are impossible to open without scissors, which one does not have. So remember to ask the seller to open it or you will not be using the purchase in a hurry.

3/ Food containers are getting there. And so are the tools available at home to open just about the nastiest of packages. I love the one that has various size possibilities to create a lever around glass jar lids.

4/ Not huge on make-up but I have got some nail polish. The nail polish has a beautiful cover on top of the real lid and when one tries to open the polish the beauty does the rounds on the real lid and nothing opens.

5/ Tiny toothpaste tubes in airline kits have very tight lids which are at times really tricky to open. A struggle with toothpaste in an airplane WC while the queue gets longer… not my idea of fun.

6/ Wine corks. Some of them are so tight that the travel kit opener has a tough time opening them. Hotel room. Away from home. Wouldn’t mind a glass of wine while reading…. go to corner store, have a friendly chat with store keeper as feeling elated already by the quiet moment with the book and the glass of wine. Arrive in room, prepare bath, or what ever, go to open bottle….call reception for help and then really need that bath. Alternatively, buy Australian wine with screw tops [many Oz marks seem to have those].

In general I wonder about the amount of plastic still used to surround the products.

Are we suffering again for the minority, which do not travel, carry scissors and tools everywhere, who steal in hotels so they are not kitted out or are these just an excuse to not innovate?

=> happy to say that many of these issues have seen progress over the few years since I wrote this [comment Aug 09]