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I discovered a secret squirrel announcement on the TranzMetro website yesterday while looking for delays. It details a free travel day on Friday 26 February and a 5% discount on March Monthly and Quarterly passes. This is to apologise for the delays that were experienced by train commuters last week.

While on the site, I also discovered that TranzMetro are keeping (or attempting to keep) performance information. The target is 95% of services arriving and leaving within 3 minutes of the scheduled time. I assume the averages are for all services. It would be interesting to see what they are for peak times as I have never ever been on time at my destination. The express is supposed to take 50 minutes but it usually arrives in a little over 60 minutes in either direction. So a 0% average from the stats I’m keeping.

The cars that I want to own are so far out of my reach it’s not funny. I know this but yet I still want them. That is the hold they have on people. It’s has to be some sort of magic spell. I’m heading up to Top Gear Live this weekend to see such cars. Cars that cost more that my house and driven with no worries about insurance premiums, maintenaince costs, fuel bills or garaging. I can’t wait!

Yesterday evening I got passed by one of these super cars. An Audi R8, in silver. It was only the V8 version . . . I mean come on, 400+ HP is not nearly enough ;) He came out of no where and passed me in my 4 door family sedan. However, do you think he disappeared off into the distance? Not a change. The reason being, we were merging into a single lane of a goat track. Stuck behind several trucks and a line of cars not willing to attempt the speed limit.

This makes me wonder as to the practicality (as far as a super car can be practical) of these vehicles. All cars out there will break the speed limit; some you’ll be trying hard to though. With the number of speed enforcment folk hiding out on corners or at the end of passing lanes, is it worth having a vehicle that doesn’t just get you from A to B in relative comfort?

Yes, I still want a super car . . . but will settle . . . for a M3 :)

Pics of the Menace and SWAT playing jerseys for 2010 have been released on AustraliaPaintball.com. They look pretty similar and the colour might make it hard to differentiate on the field for the fans ;) However, they are both Action Paintball teams.

This year, the Pro division will be playing the M7 format. A big change from previous years in the Super 7s. Semi-Pro will be playing 7 man and Amateur 5 man.

Div 1 – Pro:
* M7 Race to 3
* 8 minute games
* 1 timeout per team per match
* 9 guys on a team roster (7 in a single match)

This is a fast and furious way to play paintball.

Div 2 – Semi Pro
* Standard 7 man (up to 9 on a roster)
* 7 minute games (return flag)
* Same format as previous years

Since this has been the most popular division in the Super 7s over the last couple of years, we’ve taken the whole “If it aint broke so don’t fix it” approach.

Div 3 – Amateur
* Standard 5 man (7 on a roster)
* 5 minute games (return flag)

There will also be series point penalties for having multiple US/European Pro and Semi-Pro ranked players on the roster. This is to try and limit the impact of stacking a team with Pro players in order to win the Championship.

Div 1 – Professional:
No penalty for the first US/European ranked Pro or Semi Pro player then 2 ranking points for each extra US/European ranked Pro or Semi Pro player will be taken off the series Championship Points for the teams final result .

Div 2 – Semi Pro:
No US/European Pro or Semi Pro players allowed on roster. Oz Semi Pro teams can have one O/S Div 2 or lower on roster only for event or 1 Australian Pro ranked player per event.

Div 3: Amateur:
No US/European Pro or Semi Pro/D2 players or Australian Pro players allowed on the roster. Only one US/European D3 or lower Australian semi Pro Player allowed on Roster per event. For all Overseas players, we will be asking to see their player cards from whatever division they play in.

Menace have taken the title (and the gold rings) in 2007 and 2009. Go Menace!

I’m not referring to me, but sometimes I do think I missed my calling. Then I get passed by a 4WD who’s carving up the twisties and realise that maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a race car driver after all. Anyway, what I’m referring to are the numerous individuals and groups of pedestrians that walk along the footpaths of my city. The inconsiderate people who always manage to make themselves as wide as possible so that passing them requires considerably more effort than what it should be. It’s also common practice that we walk on the left hand side of the footpath. After all, we drive on the left so to avoid confusion walk on the left please.

Also, don’t stop in the middle of the footpath to have a chat or because you have no idea where you want to go. Move over to the side so people can pass freely. So, it is my thinking that the way in which people these days own the footpath could easily translate to the race track.

This news is a bit late. Some of you may be aware that the house we bought a year ago has had a somewhat darkish cloud hanging over it since August 2009 when it was announced by the Transport Minister that a proposed expressway would go through Paraparaumu. From the proposed plans, the two options proposed would go through three new subdivisions which would see about 400 newly built homes (including ours) knocked down.

I am pleased to say that on 15 December 2009 a third option was chosen. It’s the only sensible route along the already designated Western Link Road path which had already been ear marked as a two lane road and land set aside by Council. However, because it will be widened from two lanes to four lanes there are still properties that will be affected.

You can check out The Third Option site for all the details. This site was setup by Dr Kath Knight on behalf of the Waterstone residents and others in the path of the oiginal proposal.

I noticed some funkiness with the flickr feed in The Seven Five WordPress Theme. It would sometimes display some random persons flickr feed. Not a feature I was wanting.

As such I’ve moved back to the widgetised version of Hemingway by Ninja Monkeys! with a couple of hacks.

In an effort to simplify the look and feel of my site and try to aggregate my various online presence I have discovered a free theme from Press75 called The Seven Five WordPress Theme. It’s a work in progress at the moment but is spectacular in it’s simplicity.

I also found that posting every tweet I made to my blog was getting tiresome. It muddled the look, even with a minimalistic theme and essentially made my homepage look uninteresting.