Mii

If you haven't played on a Wii, you're missing out big time. I bought a Wii and got mine the night (yes, just after midnight- I was working late anyway!) they were released in December.

One of the cool (or cutest?) things on a Wii are called Miis (pronounced "me's"). These are little caractitures of you, your friends or whoever you want to make it look like. Here's a portrait one that I made of myself.

I use this one in all my games that use Miis. So, in my little library, that's Wii Sports.
If you want to know more about Miis, Wikipedia has a pretty good entry on them here.


Some of you who are more clued in than others about Wiis and Miis may be wondering how I got my Mii on this post...
Well, I found two lovely tools, my friends: miitransfer and miieditor. Miitransfer is mac only, and pretty buggy (it took me about 10 goes to get my controller to pair up properly, but I'm sure there are Windows equivalents for you weirdos who prefer it). However, Miieditor.com will let you create your own Miis online! Yes that's right, friends- you too, with or without access to a Wii can create, edit and save your lovely little Miis.
Enjoy your Mii creating and play a Wii!

Chairs!

I bought a pair of chairs today!
I got them from the Lifeline shed a few blocks from our house. They were pretty dusty, but I vacuumed them for a while and banged them and wiped them and they arent too bad now. Pretty comfy too.
I think (I'm not certain) that these are the first pieces of furniture I have bought.

Here's a pic of one of them. The other one is exactly the same as this one.
Do you like the green? It's more greeny than in this pic.

Iicence saga pt 2

I re-booked the driving test for the next Thursday (now last Thursday) the day after my first attempt. I then asked Janie Root if I could use her car for the test. She was very kind and supportive and even offered to take me out for a practice or two during the week.
I felt quite confident following the practice we had on Wednesday afternoon. So, in the morning after scripture classes, Matt and I headed down to the RTA for round 2.
Bob recognised me straight away and smiled. After a few minutes, he called me to the counter.
Bob was going to be taking me out for this test too.
After Janie's car was given the all-clear, we headed out on the exact same test route we had done a week earlier.
Upon our return, I was fairly confident I had passed. The only thing that had me worried was a little nudge I had given the kerb and the extra (4th) movement I made during my reverse park.
I watched nervously with Matt as Bob added up my score a few metres away. Bob doesn't give much away in his body language.
Bob congratulated me, I had passed!
I was still a little rough on the controls, but he reckoned that'd come with experience. Apart from that little tip, Bob said I had done quite well.

So, now I am a Provisional (P1) licence holder, I have been driving all over the place. As this weekend was mini-muster (musters are what Cornerstone calls its conferences. Mini-Muster is a mid-year one especially focussed on teams reporting back to centres), I did a lot of to-ing and fro-ing. A down side of having my licence is that yesterday I had to drop Matt off at the bus station to catch the 3:45AM bus to Dubbo. I have to take Aaron and Jaz (Jaz is from the Strathalbyn team, who were visiting for mini-muster) to catch the early-morning bus. The three of them are going to Dubbo for elective modules in the course that require face-to-face class time. But, I figure they have driven me to catch the bus a few times, so it's about time I returned the favour.

The new restrictions on P1 drivers are a bit harsh. I can't use a mobile at all- not even with a handsfree kit. Also, if I am caught speeding at all, I face a three month immediate licence suspension and a loss of 4 demerit points. That's pretty hard, since P-platers only get 3 points to start with. As well as this, not displaying your P-plate properly means a fine and two demerit points!

Driving Carefully,
Andrew Schultz

My driver's licence saga

Last Thursday I was booked in to do my DART test at the Broken Hill RTA.
I was feeling a bit nervous, so after scripture class, Matt and I went for a drive just before the test.
We arrived at the RTA about 15 minutes before the appointment and was called to the counter a little while later. Handing him the completed forms and my logbook, I waited for him to tell me to go out to the car.
"I can only count 36 hours here."
My heart jumped. I was sure I'd counted well over the required 50 hours. There goes 45 bucks, I thought.
"You have to add up the subtotals yourself"
You're kidding. I had to stand there for like 10 minutes trying to add up 3 pages of 5-65 minute entries. When I eventually finished, I handed the logbook back, he took about 5 seconds to realise that I actually had over 60 hours logged.
"Oh, ok there's 50 here."
Thanks, Bob (his name really was Bob).
We proceeded with to forms etc and he told me to take a seat and the "testing officer" would come out in a minute.

The testing officer was a large woman with a labret who generally looked intimidatingly angry with the world.
So, Queen of the Scary RTA People and I went out to the team car, where she asked me to get in and turn on the ignition (without starting the car) and turn on the right side indicator.
I did so.
"Ok, now the left one!"
"Brakes!"
"The right side again, please?"
She seemed to be hanging around the back of the car a bit, so I started thinking something was wrong.
She came to the front of the car.
"I've just got to go in and check about that crack on the right side."
It all came flooding back. A couple of months ago, Aaron had hit our concrete gate post as he reversed out of our driveway. There was a bit of a dent and the plastic lens over the brake light and indicator was cracked on that side. Everything still worked fine, it was just superficial damage.
A few minutes later the very testing officer came out and asked me to get out of the car so she could show me the problem.
It seemed to me not to be much of a problem, as it was all still whole and worked fine.
She asked me to meet her inside the building.

Once inside I was informed that the test could not take place in that vehicle as it is, but if I could get it fixed or get another car in time, I could try again in an hour. Other wise, my $45 was going bye-bye.
As soon as I was out the door, I was on the phone trying to get another car. I succeeded. I had permission to use the black manual Pizza Runner.
The black Pizza Runners (delivery cars for the Pizza shop called "Pizza Runners"- owned and operated by Cornerstone Community) are of foreign design. As such, the indicators are located on the left side of the steering column, not the usual left side. Also, reverse gear is located left of first gear, not below fifth. Because of the new location, reverse has a special safety mechanism, which requires a lever to lifted for the stick to go into that gear.

Matt and I raced over to the Cornerstone Centre and got the car then drove around town a bit. I was suitably stressed.
Actually, I was freaking out and couldn't stop saying "Man, ohh, man... man... geez...ohhh man." and other distressed noises.
It was lunch time, so I thought we'd better go back home for a quick bite to eat.

I'll speed things up a bit, this is getting long.

I did the test in the runner (it didn't have any cracked plastic), with Bob as the testing officer. Because it's a much newer car, the gears are a lot closer together in the runner than in the cars I have been practising in. As a result, I stalled several times during the test, because I was in third gear, not first.

Going down argent street (the shopping strip in Broken hill) during the test, a guy ran in front of my car. Needless to say that He kinda freaked me out. As I turned right, I found a truck double-parked just hidden round the corner. I safely moved around him and proceeded with caution.

When we returned, Bob added up my score and called me to the counter.
"You had a few things against you today."
I know. Please don't be one of them, Bob.
Bob explained to me that we had gone slightly (and only slightly) over the middle of the road to pass he truck and that was something which earns you a fail. Besides that, all I had done wrong was the stalling and stuffed my indicating a little, which he understood was probably because I was unfamiliar with the car.
Nevertheless, Bob had to give me fail mark.

I went back the next day to book for a re-test. (Bob happened to be the one who served me at the counter!)

I'll post about round 2 with Bob later. My hands are cold.