kjp

The other day I finished reading Right and Wrong - how to decide for yourself by Hugh Mackay. It’s a pretty good read, although I probably should re-read it sometime. Two sections - first is about how to figure out what is the right thing to do, then followed by a section on examples. Interesting.

A few interesting articles:

The Irrational Electorate
Powerful Appearance
Does Religion Make People Nicer?
Polygamy is the key to a long life - being-human

After a while of not looking for any property to buy, one of the units in the complex I live in has come up for sale. I was trying to out what a fair price is, and whether I should put an offer in. The obvious risk is that economically, things are uncertain at the moment, and we’ve just had a boom in prices – short term prices are uncertain?

Anyhow, I got the sales prices of all of the units in the complex, along with the date of sale. Plotted them, linear regression on them to get the following graph. (Yes, I’m a nerd). All the units are similar (although there are differences, some are definitely better than others). Because all units are similar, it’s easier to be able to compare them, to get a trend of what is going on. Perhaps this is unlike houses? (more variability in the houses?)??.

Anyhow, below on the plot are all previous sales, along with the asking price for the unit for sale. Along with the least squares linear regression line: one for all sales, and one which takes into account resales only.

If I put an offer in, what should it be?

Well, the weak Aussie dollar has caught me out. Back in July I ordered a CD from the USA (1 AUD ~= $0.95 USD). They didn’t have it in stock, and put it on backorder. They ordered it (from Japan). They sent it to me a week or two back (1 AUD ~= $0.65 USD). (Basically, price is 30% higher than what I thought it would be). On top of this, I got caught on a higher than expected postage $13 USD (!) plus international transaction fee (credit card), takes it to ~ $45 AUD. Ouch. Whilst expensive (I’ll be more careful in future), it is a very good CD - Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra.

Also, in other dodgy music news, I was buying an album from iTunes (couldn’t find it anywhere else). I bought the album, downloaded it all. But then when I wanted to burn it to a CD. All but one of the tracks worked, the last one wasn’t authorised for my computer – even though I’d just bought it 5 minutes earlier. Tried activating and reactivating my computer (an option in iTunes), but that didn’t work. I could play everything with another media play, which I’ve used instead. Be warned.

The piece that I was getting was Charpentier – Messe de Minuit pour Noel – basically a collection of 1600 / 1700 French Christmas carols. Essentially early sacred music. We’re singing that (along with Vivaldi Magnificat) in the choir gig coming up in a few weeks time.

Orienteering for the first time in ages was at Gardens Point gardens and QUT campus. Was really good (albeit slow for me), but it was good to jog a bit further than I have been recently. (Still only around 3 or 4km since being sick). Will be going again next week too. It was good to see heaps of people using the gardens - weddings, concerts, cricket, picnics, etc.

Last Wednesday I posed the pertinent question at rostrum – Is Population Growth Good for Australian Society. It was a rush job, and not a particularly good speech – a bit vague at the start. This probably had something to do with the fact that I did it the night before and in that morning. I rushed through parts of it, probably because I wasn’t so comfortable with it.

Today I’ve got a quiet day which is good. Stay tuned for a few more posts today: CDs, red, Housing, maybe the future.