RobiNZ Personal Blog

And not a collision

And not a collision, originally uploaded by RobiNZ. Hanoi traffic is amazing. It just shouldn't work yet mostly it does. Read more →

A New Orleans Apocalypse?

A wet night in New Orleans, originally uploaded by RobiNZ. Imagine waking up, jet lagged after a long flight, and flicking on the TV to see Glen Beck (who I had never seen before) running a panel "rant" about the "Apocalypse" and "The Rapture". It was probably the first time I'd seen Fox, and Glen Beck, so wondered what this "News" channel was reporting? Then I opened the curtains to see this! It was just a wet night in New Orleans and, even jet lagged, didn't take too long to figure out how crazy Beck can be... Read more →

“Route 66 in a Fiat”, a blog of Multipla travels

Route 66 in a Fiat isn’t new but I haven’t blogged about it before, think I did Tweet at the time. It is here for my future reference as I’d love to do a road trip in the US one day. We got the Multipla in New Zealand so I’m pretty familiar with it’s, you must admit, strange appearance. The Multipla uses the same generation platform as my Bravo. The style is a result of form and function as this six seat (3 wide x 2 row) people mover is shorter than my three door (5 seat) hatch! Brett, Blake... Read more →

ANZAC Day

Today is ANZAC Day which commemorates the New Zealanders killed in war and honours returned servicemen and women. It’s always a time to reflect, just one of the millions was my Mums Grandfather who died on the battlefield in the last few months of World War One (which ended 11th November – 1918). In Memory of Private ERNEST THEODORE BOCK who died age 37 on 12 September 1918 29609, New Zealand Machine Gun Battalion Husband of Isabella Jane Bock, of 19 Russell St., Linwood, Christchurch. Born in South Australia. Remembered with honour; GREVILLERS (NEW ZEALAND) MEMORIAL Commemorated in perpetuity by... Read more →

I can't get no GetSatisfaction (but I did a little bit later)

I can't get no GetSatisfaction (but I did a little bit later), originally uploaded by RobiNZ. It was a temporary glitch but had me huming... Read more →

Pacific Blues, 38,000 ft over ?

38,000 ft over ?, originally uploaded by RobiNZ. I love how this colour looks like clever use of filters/tints (real or digital). All I did was point the camera out the window of a Korean Airlines 777 somewhere over the Pacific between Auckland & Seoul and click! Read more →

The 2010 Alfa Romeo Giulietta, the most important Alfa ever?

I’ve read this is the Alfa that will decide the fate of Alfa Romeo’s return to the USA, perhaps even the future of Alfa Romeo itself. The platform has to be good as it’s going to the base for a range of Fiat Group, maybe even Chrysler, cars. After the Stilo stumble, a nicer (but plainly stop gap) Bravo Mk3 the whole Fiat group need this midsize platform to be excellent. The early reports seem promising with talk (see this CAR review) of responsive handling and steering, achieved without overly harsh ride. All I can say, not having seen “in... Read more →

The Philosophical Zombie Blog(s)

A long time ago, well August 2005 which I guess isn’t long on the cosmological timescale but is a while in human terms, I posted, with permission, a great, well I thought it was but she probably didn’t, review of “An evening with Jeanette Wilson”. Carl, who wrote it, didn’t have a blog but now he does and I’ve subscribed! Philosophical Zombie - philosophicalzombie.net Subscribe I think I’m conscious. But I can’t prove it. Read more →

Message to Telecom NZ (Updated)

UPDATE 2010-04-20: Back to full speed broadband. How did we ever do anything with dial-up! Thank you to @VodafoneNZ for the 3G data (part of my iPhone plan) that kept me sane/going through the slowdown! This was tweeted but I’ll capture it here: @TelecomNZ Instead of "You've exceeded your data cap we may slow you down" msg why not "would you like more this month for some extra $"? I have quite a large data quota but this month, even before those Autodesk downloads!, have exceeded it. This results in an email from Telecom with: “As you are on a... Read more →

Pastafarian Holidays

Some Pastafarian days to remember*: Feb 12: Darwin's birthday Feb 13: anniversary of Kansas State Board of Education voting to reject the teaching of intelligent design Feb 14: what the heck, go for 3 days and include Valentine's Day... pirates need love, too March 28: anniversary of the publication of "The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster" April 13: Thomas Jefferson's birthday (This Kiwi had to look up why this one was a pasta’memorial) September 15: Marco Polo's birthday September 19: International Talk Like a Pirate Day (get your pirate costume out early, why wait for Halloween?) October: National Pasta... Read more →