Marco, marco, marco…

marco at the woolpack
Marco at The Woolpack, Surry Hills

Marco, marco, marco… Where for art though Marco?

This is an old photo, taken back when he was cool and performing at The Woolpack, Chalmers Street, Surry Hills (aka Redfern). Those were the days. Poker, Karaoke, Trivia, Disco… OH, hang on, you didn’t do the karaoke there.

He was cool back then, but he’s way more cooler now ;-)

An entertainer, karaoke master, DJ, poker TD, MC (weddings, parties, anything), jack of most trades and master of everything. Go visit him on facebook: Marco

My head hurts…

my head hurtsI had a really big year last year, and it looks as though this year is not going to get any slower. I spent the vast majority (90+%) in Thailand and had a WOW of a time. You have to take the bad with the good. But all in all, it was pretty good.

I’ve jumped online to find a few old stories I’d written and found that I have got over 20 drafts sitting in my queue, waiting for photos, or for me to get my act together and finish writing them up.

Last year as a whole was great, we made the move to Thailand, we got married (again) and I had many friends and family come over for it. It was really a great time. I had friends come and visit me throughout the year, and I even made the occasional trip to other countries to see friends of mine.

But what really rounded out the year was a month we spent in Bangkok (while doing Fah’s migration paperwork), and the road trip we undertook to get back to Phuket. What is a long day trip to drive from Bangkok to Phuket, took us a week to complete. No mishaps, no misadventures. Just all round great fun and good times. I WILL post up some photos about Kanchanaburi (the bridge over the river Kwai, Hell fire pass, and others), The floating markets at Damnoen Saduak, Hua Hin, and Ranong.

Then, in October, a good friend asked us onto a charter yacht. It was me, him and our better halves. Ten days on the ocean, sailing the Phang Nga Bay, and the Anderman Sea. Those days have become etched in my mind forever, as one of the best holidays I’d ever had, and rounded out a solid year to living in the Land of Smiles.

The motion of the ocean turned out to be better than what we’d thought. During that time, Fah has fallen pregnant and we’re now expecting our very own little Dave or Fah running around in the coming year. Certainly has given us something to think about over the last few months.

Fah got her temporary resident visa, and is now allowed to live, work and play here. We’ve even got the new baby and mother-to-be all sorted with Medicare.

In between all this, I managed to break my leg Paragliding, and that really has taken a lot of fun out of the new year. It’s still on the mend, and as we speak I’m still hobbling around. I have been totally out of action for five weeks and it’s killing me. This has forced me into finding another passion to take my mind off the absence of flight…

…and what do I get into? Remote Controlled aircraft! Hell, if I can’t be in the air, I’ll be controlling something that IS! It finally arrived just yesterday, I haven’t taken it out yet, I can’t walk well enough to go fetch it. Besides, I’m spending A LOT of time on the flight simulator with the controller in an effort to learn what it is you have to do! I should get it up in the air in the next day or two and hopefully I’ll be able to report back that I haven’t crashed it just yet!

Hopefully within a month or so, I can be physically back in the air myself! Try and get some flying in BEFORE I have all my free time taken away from me.

In the coming weeks you’ll see some stories up here of the things I’ve done, and am currently doing. Some of the dribbles you should read about will include:

  • The bridge over the river Kwai
  • Hell fire pass
  • Erawan National Park
  • Floating markets at Damnoen Saduak
  • Sailing around Thailand
  • Paragliding
  • Leg breaking (and recovery)
  • Remote control toys, and eventually (further down the track)
  • Baby stories and ultra sounds!

Yeah, last year flew by, and somehow, I think this year is going to be just as quick.

My head hurts! ;^D

Finish what you start

I just got this in an email…

I am passing this on to you because it definitely worked for me today, and we all could probably use more calm in our lives. Some doctor on tv this morning said the way to achieve inner peace is to finish all the things you have started.

I looked around my house to see things I’d started and hadn’t finished.

So I have managed to finish off a bottle of Merlot…
a bottle of Chardonnay…
a bodle of Baileys… a butle of wum………..
a pockage of Prungles.. tha mainder of bot Prozic and Valiuminun scriptins…
the res of the chesescke an a box a chocletz.

Yu haf no idr how bludy fablus I feel rite now. Plaese sned dhis orn to dem yu fee ar in ned ov iennr pisss. An telum,u blody luvum.!! Xxx

singing the spirit home

Singing the Spirit Home
They come for him in the morning, on hour before the dawning
The pale white moon was waning in the African sky
The cell-door flew wide open and they stood looking at him
He saw no mercy in their hearts, no pity in their eyes
As they took him and they bound him, tied his trembling hands behind him
He felt his courage leave him, his manhood disappear
His legs would not support him, so from the cell they dragged him
He sobbed and screamed cad cursed them in his loneliness and fear

Chain, chains, chains—how many souls have died in freedom’s name?
To some it is a way of life, to others just a word
To some it is a snow white dove, to some a bloodied sword
But until the lost chain falls
Freedom will make slaves of us all.

With faces closed and hidden the white guards walked beside him
Indifferent to his pleading, they’d been down this path before
But other ears were listening, other eyes were watching
Other hearts beat with him in his final desperate hour
From the darkness of that prison come the sound of his brothers singing

“Courage” their voices told him “You do not walk alone”
From their cells beyond the shadow, he heard their voices echo
As in love and pride and sorrow they sang his spirit home

And their song of hope and freedom it rang inside that prison
It beat against the iron bars and crashed against the stone
As in their fear and hate they hung him the last sound that filled his being
Was his brothers singing, singing, singing his spirit home

“Courage brother, you do not walk olone
We will walk with you and sing your spirit home”

mydomain.com, mydomainwebhosting, mysql and localhost

I recently thought I would try a new webhost. I’ve been with my current one for a number of years, and the relationship, whilst not perfect, has stood the test of time.

I have opened up a mydomain.com web hosting account, mainly because the second ever domain (and every other–bar one–domain purchase has been through them). As a Domain Name Service, I haven’t had much to gripe about. In fact, the only thing I would like to see is a way to have a permanent number of domains show in the backend for administration. The default is 20 and I have more than that many domains, so to see all my domains I must reload the page with a higher number of domains to show… Nit picky, but it all takes times…

I have digressed…

I recently installed a wordpress installation on a mydomainwebhost. Whilst it was reasonably painless (it wasn’t without pain), it worked. I needed a call to customer support for a PHP4/5 support query, but otherwise, the install went ok. Until it came time to put in the MySQL server name.

Have you ever tried searching google for things involving “mydomain”? You get 1000’s, 100,000’s search results where people are asking questions about their domain and when they quote it, what do they use as an example domain name? “mydomain.com”. Which essentially makes it impossibly hard to find suitable and proper answers to your problem.

What did I find? mydomain.com doesn’t use the default “localhost” name for their mysql database server. It uses a lesser known (and hard to find) name of: “mysql3341int.mydomainwebhost.com“. That is the name I found elsehwere on the net, and it worked for me. It SHOULD work for you.

one of these days

We used to chase that boy home from school
We called him freckle faced, red headed fool
He was different, he wasn’t cool like me
Sticks and stones didn’t break any bones
But we never left well enough alone
One day he ran away from home you see
And I passed him as he walked away
And in his eyes I heard him say

One of these days you’re gonna love me
You’ll sit down by yourself and think
About the times you pushed and shoved me
And what good friends we might have been
And then you’re gonna sigh a little
And maybe even cry a little
But one of these days you’re gonna love me

Patty Sue was a small town beauty
I took one look at her and had to pull her to me
Lord knows she should have seen right through me
When I promised her the world

But at 17 you only want one thing
I left her standing with my high school ring
Innocent tears in a pourin’ rain
As I walked away
And I still see her in my dreams
And to this day she’s whispering

One of these days you’re gonna love me
You’ll sit down by yourself and think
About the time you turned from me
And what good friends we might have been
And then you’re gonna sigh a little
And maybe even cry a little
But one of these days, you’re gonna love me

Now everybody stands up
The congregation sings
It’s a song of sweet forgiveness
And as the chorus rings
The wind blows clear my memory
The pages start to turn
And suddenly I’m singing
The moment that I learn

One of these days I’m gonna love me
And feel the joy of sweet release
One of these days I’ll rise above me
And at last I’ll find some peace
And then I’m gonna smile a little
And maybe even laugh a little
But one of these days…
I’m gonna love me

i’m not ready to make nice

Forgive, sounds good
Forget, I’m not sure I could
They say time heals everything
But I’m still waiting

I’m through with doubt
There’s nothing left for me to figure out
I’ve paid a price
And I’ll keep paying

I’m not ready to make nice
I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and I don’t have time
To go round and round and round

It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
‘Cause I’m mad as hell, can’t bring myself
To do what it is you think I should

I know you said
Can’t you just get over it??
It turned my whole world around
And I kinda like it

I made my bed and I sleep like a baby
With no regrets and I don’t mind sayin’
It’s a sad, sad story when a mother will teach her
Daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger

And how in the world can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they’d write me a letter sayin’ that I better
Shut up and sing or my life will be over

I’m not ready to make nice
I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and I don’t have time
To go round and round and round

It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
‘Cause I’m mad as hell, can’t bring myself
To do what it is you think I should

I’m not ready to make nice…
I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and I don’t have time
To go round and round and round

It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
‘Cause I’m mad as hell, can’t bring myself
To do what it is you think I should

What it is you think I should

Forgive, sounds good
Forget, I’m not sure I could
They say time heals everything
But I’m still waiting