Dave's Cave

Where the speaking is plain…

Under construction

Very much under construction, I'm afraid; I'm an engineer, not a bloody artist.

Whilst you're here, though, you may as well check out my spam page…

Here's my GPG2 public key, and its fingerprint.

Random Ravings, Observations, and Oddities

This gets updated from time to time whenever I'm in a weird mood (this happens often).

Kiddies won't go to bed? Frighten them with this. And if you look carefully, you can see his comb-over… He must've practised that in a mirror for hours :-)

A fine collection of the mighty 3801 (photographer: S.Macfarlane).

A pretty awful picture of the conjunction of Venus and Jupiter around 0530 AEST on 1st May 2022.

My goodness! We seem to have a cure for COVID-19; this tripe landed in my letterbox…

Pretty much the situation in Ukraine right now…

The importance of enunciation…

Here is the first picture taken by the James Webb telescope.

Here is the best description of non-fungible tokens that I have ever seen…

Here's the truth behind COVID-19, bats, and RF…

Here's my attempt at photographing April 2020's super moon (iPhone 5s, moderate light pollution, cloud cover); I forgot to switch off the outside light hence you can see the verandah railing :-(

How Aussies keep their social distance…

And even wallabies keep their social distance.

For those interested in crypto, this image was encrypted using ECB (Electronic CodeBook) mode, which unfortunately is quite a common mistake amongst those who "roll their own"; can you guess what the original image was?

One way to keep social distancing during the coronavirus outbreak…

My solution to the Corona virus.

Breakfast time for the magpies…

This is what I look like when I'm in a twisted mood.

Just the thing for your server room…

A sorry tale (RTF) of an inexcusable fault involving both Telstra and NBN which took me off air for nearly two months.

A potential solution to the "Bunnings Onion on or under Sausage" problem.

I tore my left Achilles tendon a while ago (ouch!), and am now condemned to wear a "moon boot" for a few weeks; here are the individual bits (the boot itself, the inflatable wrap-around sock, and the stiffener), and I'm wearing it here (pardon the hairy leg); yes, it's uncomfortable, and it locks the ankle really tight! The trouble is, I keep forgetting how to do the damned thing up…

Want to see a typical Aussie snack?

And here's a genuine square pie…

Here's my List Of Notable Amateurs that I've been maintaining for yonks; updates are welcome.

Here's where Traffic Light No. 1 is in Sydney; corner of Kent and Market Sts. She was the first set installed (1933), moved to Bankstown some time in the 80s, and is now back home again.

Seen on the menu at the Collaroy Beach Club; can you spot the odd dish out? Hey, man…

Telstra swears blind that they have a shop here in the Gosford Imperial Centre; can you find it?

Do you support an Australian citizen for our Head of State, instead of some hereditary unelected foreigner? If so, then join the Australian Republic Movement.

And while you're at it, you may as well support I am Australian as our National Anthem; the current one sounds like a bloody funeral dirge!

For lovers of Austen Tayshus and his "Australiana" skit, you can't go past this (and fsck off, kopyright kops). The trick is to pick all the Aussie references (some are quite subtle)…

UnixArchive is a mirror of the Unix archive found over on TUHS; browse and enjoy :-)

The mighty B-29 Superfortress "Doc" flies again! Just over 7 minutes long, and a bit over 80MB. Also includes a "Rosie the Riveter".

This is what an arthritic vertebra looks like. Yes, it hurts; that second bone from the top ought to be rectangular, not trapezoidal.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water… yes, it's a Great White, and he beat it off.

Here are the time beeps for the 2015 Leap Second. Notice the extended gap between the second and third beeps.

Apropos the metadata retention debate currently raging in Australia, is the USPS spying on you?

Whoever invented “Super Glue” (you know, the stuff that sticks to skin) should take a bath in it.

Those stupid "hygenic" rubber gloves... Ever thought about what happens seconds after you don them? They end up crawling with bacteria, that's what! Their sole purpose is to interpose a barrier between your hands and whatever it is that you're handling, OK? Idiots…

What is it with people who feel the need to use pseudonyms on social media sites? Are they ashamed of the name that their parents bestowed upon them or something? I'd make a list, but it would only provide those sad individuals with publicity.

Memo to shock-jock Alan Jones: always check your background before speaking; you might get photographed…

And here, Barbie scores one for the sisterhood; well, at least until Mattel find out anyway…

I wish someone would invent a room-freshener that smells of spring onions, shallots, whatever…. Heavenly.

Call me a locavore (and I've been called worse things), but I don't care if the stuff is slightly blemished; just have a think about what happens to it after you swallow, OK? Hint: it gets churned up and shat out the other end… Are you trying to impress visitors or something equally stupid?

The NRA — protecting your right to shoot small school-children, the right of kiddies to shoot their parents in turn, and the right to shoot innocent civilians in general (and last I heard are now bankrupt)… Fat lot of good that precious “right” did in Las Vegas, in 2017; apparently some of the attendees were armed… Sigh; how many people have to be murdered by the NRA supporters before Amerika wakes up? When will Amerika finally become civilised, and stop shooting themselves? Or shall we just let Natural Selection take over instead? Datum: no mass shootings in Australia since the gun crackdown following the Port Arthur massacre in 1996 (over 20 years ago); Amerika: mass shootings every day on average, and it's not even newsworthy… Perhaps world governments should issue travel warnings about USA, just like a third-world country. And President Twat's solution to more school-shootings? Arm the teachers! So, all a shooter needs to do is to take out the teachers first... Yep, the way to fix the problem of "too many guns" is "more guns". Factoid: Canada has pretty much the same gun laws as Amerika, yet only a fraction of the violence. As Prof. Julius Sumner-Miller would ask, why is this so?

Some reasons to not use Gmail.

Why CAPTCHAs are useless.

Subscribe to one of Security Focus' lists? Then read this and decide for yourself the level of their competence.

Ever wondered whence came those funny Latin phrases that you see as filler text? Check out the Lorem Ipsum page.

A true geek can understand the XKCD cartoons without needing them explained.

You have to have been reading Bristow for ages to be truly enlightened.

And who hasn't heard of User Friendly?

Or The Daily WTF?

I love to learn A Word A Day…

Devout christians are advised to not see this comic…

My favourite mailing lists

To come...

Gnuplot and me

Ever since I discovered Gnuplot, I've been plotting everything in sight; it must be my statistics background, or something… Take a gander at these for my pitiful attempts; just don't point at me and snigger, OK?

Musical Interludes

My heart beats to 4/4 time, and I still have tinnitus from such luminaries as Suzi Quatro, The Who, The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Slade, etc (it was worth it!). The louder the better; I hear that Marshall have released a range of retro-fit knobs that go up to “11”…

Here's an affordable Marshall stack (as of 13/1/22)… If that page has vanished then here is an image that I ~~stole~~ downloaded instead; I can now say with a straight face that I have a genuine Marshall stack :-)

Snippets of Suzi Quatro at a concert in 2007. My seat was right in front of one of her stacks; bliss!

Barry McGuire doing a bit of Eve of Destruction in 2008.

To be continued as I find 'em…

Heavy Metal

No, I don't mean the musical genre (and never get between me and a Marshall stack), but raw frothing iron. Check out these ships' engine rooms and the bits that surround them. Yeah, one day I'll thumb-nail 'em.

Floating Beauties

I have a thing for The Two Queens; check 'em out here in 2007 on Sydney Harbour, and again here in 2008. Beauty personified… Am I the only one who thinks that most "luxury" ships these days are bloody fugly? I've seen prettier sheep-carriers!

Building Bridges

I also have a thing about bridges; pix to come when I find 'em.

The Dish

If you have an ounce of appreciation for things both mechanical and astronomical, then you might appreciate these snaps of the Parkes Radio Telescope. Yeah, I'll thumb-nail 'em one of these days.

My recipes

Coming soon…

A Simple Q and A

Who are you, anyway?

I am Dave Horsfall, but you may call me “Dave”; just don't call me late for dinner, OK?

Very funny; now, who are you really?

I've already told you; don't you understand Plain English?

OK, so what do you do for a living?

Trying to avoid the alternative, silly.

Well, what's your Twitter handle then?

My what, sorry?

Alright then, where's your Facebook page?

Uhh… See answer to previous question.

Don't you have a social media site?

You blundered across this interweb thing, didn't you?

Well, what about a blog?

What's that?

What are you, a left-wing hippie communist or something?

Something like that.

Or a martian?

No, I'm bipedal, just like you.

OK, your sense of humour is as warped as mine. Can I link to your site?

Well, I'm sure that you can, but as to whether you may… I'm a stickler for grammar (and British English).

Everyone's a comedian… OK, may I link to your site?

Well, I guess I can't stop you, so go right ahead. I'm not vain enough to check my “Referer:”[sic] logs, but I do check for malicious attempts; those are a great way to get yourself firewalled. Permanently. See oubliette for further information.

What about an RSS feed?

Speak English, will you?

Sigh… You're one sick puppy.

Why, thank you! I tries hard, and I can be very trying.

If you're silly enough to want to email me (and fancy your chances of getting past my spam filters), try here; on the other paw, if you are a filthy spammer and you wish to be added to my oubliette, then this is your best bet.

Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)
dave@horsfall.org

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