This photo was taken with my Nikkor 18-35mm f/2.8 on my D60. The lens doesn't have image stabilisation (IS in Canon lingo and VR in Nikon lingo). It's a wide angle zoom, and it's fast so you usually don't have to worry about hand holding the camera in low light (camera shake is more of a problem with telephotos and less of a problem with wide angle). It was taken at 17mm f/2.8 at 1/10 of a second. At 17mm it's the same view you'd get on a film camera as about 25mm, so the traditional rule of thumb is that you should shoot it at at least 1/30 of a second (one over focal length).

• 11 February 2009 03:30pm: Is there NOTHING that will covert a flow tools file into IPFIX? Without UDP buffer overruns? Of course? It's always the UDP buffer overruns.
• 12 February 2009 07:14am: Suddenly Google talk is working with my Jabber server again. Awesome guys only took you forever and a day.
• 13 February 2009 10:16pm: Annoyed I found a bunch of E-6 to scan this weekend but I left it at The Point and the scanner and I are in Wyoming :(
• Yesterday at 11:25am: I just blew my share of the federal stimulus handout on camera gear and I haven't even gotten it yet.
• Today at 10:01am: the graveyard looks pretty after rain with the sun shining on it.
• Today at 11:10am: it's like we have our weekly meeting every week now. crazy.
• Today at 11:26am: Lenny is finally blessed as stable. We've been using it production for over a year.

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• 5 February 2009 12:11pm: Quarterly update means free lunch after. Always nice food too.
• 5 February 2009 04:21pm: Allison is whining because we don't have any spare hard drives to give her. It's getting annoying.
• 5 February 2009 05:01pm: I was just thinking Allison's behaviour would be age appropriate for my little sister... seven years ago when she was six that is.
• 5 February 2009 10:21pm: It will be good to spend a few days at The Point and not have to commute all the way to/from Wyoming every day.
• 6 February 2009 08:37am: Standing room only on the train. Nose to stinky arm pit.
• 6 February 2009 10:18am: I started saying ko again. It's weird.
• 6 February 2009 03:54pm: Mail server migration went off pretty much without a hitch but the connection to muse dropped out and now I can't update the DNS! *sigh*
• 6 February 2009 04:12pm: Got to muse. nullslice is now nullray. Your local DNS server may take a while to update.
• 6 February 2009 10:38pm: of course I spoke too soon because there was stuff I forgot... :/
• Yesterday at 06:43pm: I am going to start saying "after now" again. It's like I pick up a camera and I turn into myself three years ago.
• Today at 05:56pm: 65 dead in Victoria. How much longer before they stop saying "..since Ash Wednesday" and just say "deadliest fires in Australian history" :(

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At work yesterday, I got into this drawn out argument with my boss about an API that I had designed (and implemented). It was a respectful argument and in the end I think we came to a compromise that we were both mildly happy with. It is a funny thing because this one little function call seemed pretty uncontroversial when I wrote it, but it has somehow managed to draw the most criticism (Gordon suggested a change which didn’t get made weeks ago).

I hate arguing with people because whenever I look back on arguments I see how I was either too zealous in arguing my point, or give in too easily. On Friday I was arguing with Kim about macro lenses. Short version is that I made an assertion that, while true if explained correctly, I didn’t feel like arguing the point. That feels like every argument (read: every conversation) that I have with her, as she is totally unable to see my perspective, as a result I sort of intensely dislike her.

Yesterday was also Russian and I was going to bring my computer with me so that I could go to Potts Point after class instead of home (Potts Point is closer). Only when I left work I realised my computer wasn’t in my backpack and I panicked. I remembered closing the lid to my computer so that it would go to sleep, but I couldn’t remember if I had actually put it in my backpack. The only time I hadn’t had my backpack with me was when I left it at work briefly to go to the bathroom and if it had been stolen that would have meant it would have been someone at work. I was relieved when I got home and it was sitting in its place, asleep, but unmoved. I felt weird that I could have thought that someone at work could have taken it, because it is a smal company and everyone knows everyone (not that people don’t steel in those situations, but it is somehow worse when they do?).

I usually make it a rule not to get to close to my co-workers. I was hoping this might be an exception, but days like yesterday remind me that there are reasons that I have those rules. Nothing really terrible happened (in the end), but events leave me vaguely uneasy.