| RavenBlog |
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| Comments on Tuesday 24 June 2003: |
Hooray, Australia is the best. They import only the finest of American TV; Passions.Disturbingly blonde girl: "But she can't be a witch."Australia also has the best food in the universe; Maggi noodles. I used to go out of my way, in England, to acquire this fine delicacy. Here, it's the default cheap noodle in the supermarkets - and not only that, it has additional stupid disgusting flavours available that I would never have imagined, such as "fried onion" and "tomato". And, to make matters even better, they also have my favourite noodle found in America, the 'Hot' flavour of Shin Ramyun, also in the supermarkets. And not only that, they have Picalilli, though they call it, rather more descriptively, Mustard Pickles. And they have crazy crisps made of rice or chick-peas. In salt-and-vinegar flavour that doesn't contain milk. We also have a fridge now. If we can get the broadband as described (which is still questionable; the ADSL provisioning is about as efficient and predictable as it was in America) then it's not nearly as bad as has been made out, either - 512k-128k ADSL of pseudo-unlimited for AU$100 (just marginally more than the US$50 it was when we were trying to get such things in America). And possibly, relatively soon, fibreoptics. [06:01] |
| Eps |
| I agree, Australia is the best. :P Though some of the tv programs really do scare me. Watch ACA and Today Tonight to see what I mean. Don't hold your breath for fibre, I'm telling you. (I'm still holding my breath for wireless, isdn, vDSL, cable, cat5 and many others. I'm looking very blue now. - Though there are alternatives that people like myself are looking into...) As for noodles, I have the "10 pack" of beef favour in the place that you keep food that I seem to have forgotten what it's name is... (I don't like any other flavour.) *What’s big, white, sits in tree's and hurts when it falls on you? A FRIDGE!!! *What is large, has six legs and falls out of tree's? A POOLTABLE!!! ...They were funny at the time, though the time was after seven days of being in the middle of nowhere and having no hope of getting out. And I leave you with this thought, "Repeated Failure to pay your BAS will result in a $60,000 fine and 5 years imprisonment" Back to trying to work out how to install debian... -eps- |
| Holly |
| Tsk, *must* you keep saying things? I suppose it all helps to stop RavenBlack from having an unrealistically positive view of the intelligence of the Australian populace. But even so. |
| Solistus |
| That was rather harsh. I remember the unique and unforgettable joys of waiting for the DSL company for weeks on end, only to have them do everything wrong and have to start over. I've been fortunate enough to go through this twice; the second time was about 2 weeks longer than it "should" have been (when the incompetance of SW BEll is taken into account) because that's how long it took them to figure out that the order in which they were trying to cancel our old subscription (which was no longer functional due to some failure on their part) and sign us up for a new one was actually just signing us up and then immediately cancelling our new subscription... you'd think a major utility company would know how their own software functions. |
| Kanada Ten |
| "you'd think a major utility company would know how their own software functions." -Solistus Public Radio had a marvelous commentary on this subject when DSL was first introduced in Chicago land. Though I have absolutely no intention of finding it now. Instead, I'll paraphrase the humorous part until I have wrung every drop of hilarity from it. The commentator had singed up for the DSL service after receiving a letter offering the service "in his area." Several weeks later, he received another letter, which informed him that the service would not be available there for some time, so it would be cancelled. The commentator then received his normal bill with the additional DSL service charge (US$65). He called the company (SBC Ameritech) to inform them of the charge and to insure the service was cancelled. Several months, and bills, later the commentator reached, the only "caring" customer service representative he had ever reached. This individual loved her Phone Company and helping the customers. She even took the problem to the top office manager. She gave him her name, so that if the problem happened next month, he wouldn't have to start all over again. So the next month, the commentator calls the phone company and asks for (IIRC) Julie, only to discover that she was one of the personnel "let go" (I love corporate euphemisms) when they cut the service staff in half -leaving only the newest (and thus cheapest) workers. The representative he reached this time asked, "Is it really such a pain to call the phone company once a month and have us remove the charge?" "Meet the new phone company and the computers that rule it." Ah, destroyed yet another. |
| Tywick |
| That's what you get for going with SBC Ameritech. Luckily, here in Madison we have TDS Metrocom/Telecom* which has less headaches than SBC. I must admit though even TDS was a bit imcompetent but at least we got our DSL (MVL BTW) hookes up in less then a week. Because all the wiring and the account was set-up before moving in it should have been working right away. Turned out there was a filter built into the wall jack that prevented the DSL and allowed for normal phone converasion. My main gripe about the situation was all the run arounds and incompetence of the "support" people that I talked to. *Don't ask me to explain the difference it can be quite confusing. |
| Solistus |
| SBC has put all its competition out of business here, there is no alternative (aside from Cable, which is just as bad and requires you to buy or lease the cable box). |
| Nightshade |
| Mmmm.. Maggi noodles. I get those here in Canada. If I'd known you were a fan, I could have mailed some to you. They're available at my favorite Dutch Import store, along with the delicious substance known as "Maggi Aroma": a vaguely soy-sauce-like fluid which tastes excellent in soup, with or without noodles. |
| Tom |
| How do you pronounce 'Maggi'? Just last night it came up in conversation that Australians pronounce it differently to everybody else - Australian 'mad-gee', everybody else 'maggy'. Or something like that. |
| RavenBlack |
| Mm, though I thought Australians were pronouncing it "majjee" rather than "mad-gee". It remains that I couldn't tell the difference, phonetically, between those two, so you could be right. And yes, I pronounce it more like 'maggy', with the hard G, because there are two G's in a row. And no D or J. |
| Tom |
| Mmm, is more 'majjee' than 'mad-gee'; just trying to emphasise the difference. |
| Eps |
| Um, Australian's say it like that because of a blitz ad campaign a few years back. -eps- |
| RavenBlack |
| Shut up. That doesn't even make any sense, unless the advertiser had some crazy ulterior motive for making everyone pronounce it that way. Also, shut up some more. |
| Eps |
| Why doesn't it make sense? |
| RavenBlack |
| Shut up. |
| Eps |
| *Does* |
| Chris |
| When I lived in Holland, I was partial to "Maggi Aroma HOT!". it was like the standardMaggi but veerry! spicey. Sadly, it doesn't seem to be available now. |
| HUJU |
| So how are you meant to pronounce it? |
| RavenBlack |
| Wikipedia says (if you consult the IPA for what the pronunciation means) that it's pronounced the way I do - mag as in magazine, ee as in pee. (Hopefully nobody says majazine to confuse this answer.) |
| nessie22 |
| Aussies have always pronounced it madgee. uk have finally started selling their products and their ad cracked me up when they said maggie. just doesn't sound right! |
