James Bell

Christmas and Lights Tour - Part One

Sun, 01 Nov 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Shanghai

It’s currently 2:15am in Munich and I am wide awake. But I do have a reliable internet connection and both Gmail and Facebook work fine - unlike in China.

My trip to date has involved a lot walking and a lot of time sitting down on planes. Both flights were uneventful, but I can confirm that the Lufthansa A340-600 is nicer than the Air NZ 787-9 (quieter and better service too)

While in Shanghai I walked a total of 32 kms over two days. I largely kept to “The Bund” area of Shanghai were my hotel was.

On Wednesday I walked to the river and then down along East Nanjing Road (a very long pedestrian shopping area). I bought a cable for my iPad which I’d left at home and found a Costa Coffee store that served tea in a large dessert glass but had free Wifi and comfy chairs.

Everyone in Shanghai has a phone and is glued to it. It’s interesting that anything to do with Facebook or Google is blocked, but my Microsoft work email and Apple FaceTime worked fine. Clearly some companies are more willing to comply with censorship than others.

I returned to the waterfront to try and photograph the lights but it was cold and not very dark so I went back to the hotel.

On Thursday I walked the other direction and found the shopping area without the tourists. It was still very “western” but was catering to a local market. I walked through a few shopping malls which all seem to be both empty and under construction - its as if everyone has decided to get into the mall business, but there aren’t yet enough shops (or customers) to go around.

I waked across to the People’s Park which was nice, but followed in the Chinese tradition of having nice grass you aren’t allowed to walk on. Then I caught a hop-on hop-off sightseeing bus to take me around the bits of the city I had not seen.

Unfortunately the commentary was broken but it went over the river into the newer city which was interesting to see.

Shanghai is very modern and ‘young’ - it could very easily have been London or New York. Almost everyone on the metro was in their 20’s or 30’s - I saw very few older people or anyone who looks remotely poor - but then it’s a big city. Skyscrapers stretch on for miles and there is construction everywhere.

I made my way to the airport via Metro and Maglev train. The Maglev travels up to 300km/hr during the nine minute trip from the city to the airport - its pretty impressive.

Munich

I arrived in Munich at 5:00am and took the train to the central train station. The hotel was a short walk around the corner. While offical check in isn’t until 2:00pm, the night manager must have taken pity on my as I sat in reception warming up, because she found me a room after only about half an hour. I decided today would be a “rest day” so I could relax and catch up on sleep.

After a bit of a rest I walked around the block, bought some food from the local Aldi supermarket and lunch from McDonalds and returned back inside for a nice long nap. It was -2 today and there is still a bit of snow on the roof of the building across the road.

Germany’s oldest theatre is also across the road - Beauty and the Beast is currently performing with both dialogue and songs in German. Tickets are quite expensive tough - up to 79 Euro ($130) for the best seats

Tomorrow I’m going to try and find a department store to get a jacket and a hat and then join my tour at 6:00pm

Discovering Jean-Michel Jarre

Sat, 31 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMT

Watch on YouTube

I was introduced to Jean-Michel Jarre at one of the first Laser Tag arenas in New Zealand, possibly the world.

It was called “Futron” and was in a large warehouse next to a popular theme park in West Auckland.

It was multi-level, filled with fog machines and lasers and Star Trek style doors that opened when you shot them, and Jean-Michel Jarre played as a constant soundtrack.

I remember there were TV screens giving instructions to each team, and we have to successfully tag four pyramid “flags” throughout the playing area.

It was truely magical for a space-and-sci-fi obsessed preteen.

My friends and I only went a couple of times before it turned into paintball, which wasn’t as much fun for 11yr olds!

As a direct results of Futon, Jarre’s Rendez-vous was one of the first vinyls I ever bought and I remember playing it over and over again on weekend mornings when my parents were still in bed, happily drumming along on the sofa.

Fourth Rendez-Vous was my favourite, but by coincidence, Jarre also featured on New Zealand TV with Equinoxe, Pt. 4 used as at the theme for a popular wildlife show, Our World.

Hearing it now still gives me late 80’s family TV night flashbacks.

Watch on YouTube

If you unscrew your belly button, your bottom will fall off; and other things my Dad taught me.

Mon, 05 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMT

My Dad died on 5 December 2021.

My earliest memory is sitting on his shoulders watching a Guy Fawkes bonfire on one of several visits to the UK as a child.

An electrical engineer by trade, he worked on some of the early mainframes before moving to New Zealand to marry my mum. He loved teaching my brother, cousins, grandchildren and I about anything scientific, the ancient Lancastrian martial art of Ecky Thump and stories of building a canon and blowing a hole in the neighbours garage - but refusing to let my brother and I make anything similar!

I hope he has found my mum, who he missed dearly, and the rest of his welcoming party, at the great ISO9000 audit conference in the sky.

Below are some important life lessons he taught me over the years:

If you unscrew your belly button, your bottom will fall off.

This, along with the “lying still game” and many other “games” ensured hours of peace and quiet for adults trying to talk after dinner or at any family occasion.

Don’t play “knuckles” with my Dad. You have been warned.

Your friends and acquaintances follow you everywhere you go

It didn’t matter where we were - traveling around the country, at a hospital appointment with Mum, or a hotel in Hong Kong, Dad would suddenly strike up a conversation with a seemingly random person and it would turn out they knew each other in some obscure way.

Even the Chaplin who blessed Dad’s body at the hospital after he passed knew him from his time on the local school Board of Trustees - even in death, still finding people he knows.

Your neighbours will indulge the craziest of schemes

We were gifted a very old and very heavy piano. To get it inside required moving it from a neighbouring house to our house, and going up a considerable flight of stairs.

Rather than spend money on professional piano movers, somehow Dad convinced every abled-bodied person in our street to pitch in and help carry the piano up the stairs, which they did willingly.

At some point my friends and I collected aluminium cans to raise funds to build a clubhouse.

We didn’t collect enough to buy plywood for the walls, so we came up with the plan to cover the neighbour’s old hen-house with black polythene.

I don’t know what Mr McGregor thought when Dad turned up one afternoon with a large sheet of polythene and a staple gun but he let him cover the old hen-house with it without question.

Black polythene isn’t a great material for building clubhouses, by the way.

Delegate

Dad and I went for one practice driving lesson.

Rumour is that I rolled into the car in front of us at an intersection.

From that point on, Mum was in charge of driving lessons.

People often talk about carrying secrets to the grave. I am about to reveal one of Dad’s recent secrets.

How to troll your cousin

One of the side effects of being an engineer is the irresistible urge to take things apart.

Mum like collecting cheap outdoor solar lights that often broke (or got crushed by cars). Dad salvaged a particular light with a green LED, took it apart, and hung the still-working electrics in the dining room window.

Every night at dusk the little green light would come on.

Our cousin Maureen has been visiting for many years now, and would stay with my parents over Christmas. This particular year, she noticed the little green light hanging in the window.

“What’s that light?” she asked.

Quick as a flash, Dad explained that it was a new Auckland Council initiative to remind elderly people to close their curtains when it got dark. They had people driving round to check and if they saw the light, you got a fine.

Maureen must have been skeptical, but Mum immediately backed up Dad’s story.

For the three years that followed, Maureen would jump up as soon as the light came on to close the curtains, determined to avoid a fine.

Sadly the little LED light stopped working and was thrown away.

Maureen queried where it was the following year, and Dad explained the scheme had ended after complaints and the elderly were left to control their own curtain closing once more.

In Summary

Figure out a way to make children keep quiet and call it a game
Make enough friends so they’ll always be someone around who you know, and they’ll help with your crazy projects
You can convince anyone to believe a good story
Delegate the really dangerous jobs to your wife.

The most important thing interviewers are looking for in job interviews.

Sat, 03 Sep 2022 00:00:00 GMT

Sometimes you get candidates who you can tell just live and breathe the world you work in. They have an opinion on tabs vs spaces, they know about the latest news in the industry, and you can just sort of tell that this is something they care about.

Then, you have those who have the prepared answers, the ones who say things like “I’m passionate about creating synergistic solutions to strategic business asset evaluations" or some other corporate speak - they've read the company values and are parroting them it back to you. You can spent a whole hour with them and still feel like you don't know the real person.

In short, they aren't being genuine, they are saying what they think you want to hear.

I can already hear the people itching to comment along the lines of “but no one cares that much about a retail job, they just need the money”.

The thing is, the best candidates - the ones employers really want to hire - they do care - they have an opinion about restocking shelves, stock rotation, the best way to setup endcaps etc. Thats what makes them good candidates.

The truth is, an interviewer is trying to figure out three things:

Are you a nice person who I'd like to work with each day
Can you do the things you say you can do on your resume
And can you do it with some enthusiasm.

Thats it really.

Also, be nice to the receptionist.

In almost every interview situation I'll ask the receptionist who they liked best, and it's always the same candidate we chose. Almost makes you wonder if interviews are worth the bother!

How to figure out what jobs you (might) like to do

Wed, 20 Apr 2022 00:00:00 GMT

There isn’t really an easy answer to this other than “try jobs and see if you like them”.

That’s not super practical, so the gold standard is going to see a professional career counsellor.

This is usually a qualified psychologist who has experience applying various diagnostic tools like the MBTI or perhaps StrengthsFinder or DiSC.

They’ll use that information, along with a conversation with you, to make some recommendations on the sort of career you might like.

This can be expensive and doesn’t always get great results.

My low budget alternative is as follows:

1. Find all the jobs you like the sound of

Load up your favourite job search website, and open up every single vacancy you like the sound of.

Don’t worry about experience or qualifications or anything like that, just load up everything that you like the sound of.

2. Save and/or print your vacancies

This works best if you can print things out, but otherwise save a copy of each job advert.

3. Highlight the things that you like

Go through each of the vacancies you’ve printed and highlight the things you liked the sound of.

Maybe it’s something you are an expert in, something you’d love to learn, or something that interests you. Just go crazy with the highlighter

(Again, don’t censor here – if you like the sound of it, highlight)

4. Make a list

Go through your printed vacancies and write down all the things you’ve highlighted, one thing on each line.

5. Divide your list in three

From your big lists of things you like, assign each item to one of three lists – “Things I can do now”, “Things I’d love to do” and “Things I’d love to do that I can do now”.

6. Find jobs that match

Now you’ve got a summary of the things you like to do and your existing skills, you can start exploring jobs that match.

There isn’t a big secret here, it’s just good old fashioned research. Do some googling, follow your nose and find new ideas and start writing down job titles.

You’ll find that as you start researching new ideas will pop up and lead you in new directions.

Overall, the goal is to turn interests and skills into job ideas – this will help to focus down your job search to new areas of interest.

How to actually negotiate your freelance rate

Thu, 25 Nov 2021 00:00:00 GMT

I’ve seen a lot of freelancers working for pretty bad rates lately, so I thought I’d offer some suggestions on negotiating your rate.

This all assumes you have discussed the project and you have the time, capability and willingness to do the work.

Rule 1 - You are the expert.

You don’t take your car to the garage for repairs and then tell the mechanic how much you’ll pay. They figure out what needs doing and quote you a price. They are the expert and you trust their judgement.

It should be the same with your writing. You are the expert at providing writing services. You offer your skills at a rate, and the customer can choose if they employ you or not.

Very often your customer will have no idea on the “going rate” and part of being a professional is guiding them to the right figure.

The magic question

“What is your budget for this?”.

Almost always their budget is more than I was planning to charge, so I say “Yeah, we can work with that” and they are happy!

Or its less, and I can say “Well full price would be $XX, but if we dropped a couple of options we could work with your budget”

Or, “I’m sorry, we can’t really work with that budget - try XX down the road who are a little more budget friendly”

What if they avoid the question?

More experienced clients might be wise to the budget question (although it helps everyone if they are just honest), and will say “well what are your rates?”

Try something like “For a project like this, I’d normally charge a flat fee of $X, is that something we could work with?”, where X is twice what your got paid the last time for a similar piece of work.

If they say yes well done - a 100% profit.

More likely they’ll offer a lower rate, or at least give you some idea of what they want to pay and now we have a budget to negotiate against.

(You should be charging by project not hourly or per word as as rule, but whatever works for you)

I can’t just keep doubling my rate though

Actually you can. Because you’ll start to graduate to a better quality client as your move from one price bracket to the next.

If you are missing out on work due to price (which if you negotiating you shouldn’t be) you’ll figure out what the sweet spot is.

Or, just give them a rate

If it really comes down to it, have a rate ready. A 1000 word article at 1c per word earn you $10. If it takes you two hours to complete you are working for $5/hour.

That’s bad for everyone. For you, because its a terrible hourly rate, and for the industry, because it drives down the value of the work writers do.

So, figure out how much you’d like to earn per hour and work out how much you need to charge per word and now we have a rate to work from.

Be your own boss

Many questions I’ve seen make is seem like the poster is working for a boss. As a freelancer you are literally your own boss. Use your knowledge and expertise to lead your clients towards great quality work for a fair price and if you don’t like what they are offering - turn them down.

Along these lines - set the payment terms that you work on. “I work on a 50% deposit and 50% on completion basis”.

This is a great tool for leveraging a rate too. e.g “For projects under $50 I need payment up front before I start work”

Discounts, testimonials and loss-leaders

In general I think its a bad idea to do discounts, or free work, or cheap work in the hopes of getting more/higher paid work later. If you do a good job, a positive review shouldn’t be a problem, and I’ve found that once you have a discount in place is very difficult to go back to full price with that client again.

In Summary

Know what you are worth, and therefore willing to work for
Have a rate in mind
Ask for a budget
Lead your clients, don’t let them become your boss

Help, someone just gave me flyers to give out!

Fri, 02 Jul 2021 00:00:00 GMT

Spend any time doing community theatre and someone will almost always give you a stack of flyers or posters to “give out” to help promote the show.

Make no mistake, this is a hugely important way of getting the word out – friends, family and your community networks are one of the best ways to generate ticket sales.

Here are some ideas around what you can do with them. If you are leaving a pile somewhere, generally a stack of 10 is a good number.

Take them to work and put them out in the break room, noticeboard or around your desk. If a noticeboard is your only option then put up two – the front of one and the back of the other. If your desk is the only option everyone who interrupts you should get a flyer as punishment.
You might get away with giving them to customers at work too – but it’s best to get permission from your boss first.
Ask your favourite local cafe if you can leave some out – they usually have a space for flyers or you might get away with leaving them on the tables. Ideally you want them somewhere they won’t get tided up . This goes for any regular shop you visit – could be a bar or bakery too.
Your local library, visitor centre or information centre will probably take a small pile to put around the noticeboards. Most libraries will find space for a poster too. The trick is to tell them you are in the show and that its a community show, not a for-profit production.
Give some to your partner to take to their work. Alternatives include your mum, dad, siblings or your friends. It’s not really all that awkward to say “hey, can you put some flyers for my show out at your work” once you get used to it.
Mums (and Dads) are pretty good at this sort of thing too. They have no shame at promoting their actor-children to anyone who will listen. If you give your Mum (or Dad) some flyers they’ll be gone before you know it.
Most schools and universities have noticeboards or similar where you can leave notices of flyers.
If you are involved in other plays, other hobbies, the gym etc this is also a good option.
If you are totally out of ideas, go for a walk and deliver them into your neighbours. Out of the thirty households that get a flyer someone will be interested (and if you know the neighbours, attach a little handwritten note – “Hey, its Bob at 32. I’m doing a play! Hope you can make it”

If you are interested in computer programming

Sat, 19 Jun 2021 00:00:00 GMT

If you are even slightly interesting in computer programming, you should check out The Coding Train on YouTube.

Watch on YouTube

There are so many great videos to get lost in, but this was took up an hour of my time today.

Quick Tip : How to remember how to do links in Markdown

Sun, 18 Apr 2021 00:00:00 GMT

Found this on Twitter today. Where has this been all my life:

After 10+ years of using Markdown, it finally clicked that web links usually look like rectangles (on mouse hover), so the text is in brackets. The URL, as an additional detail to what you're reading, is in parentheses.

Not one issue since

How to find content for your personal blog

Wed, 14 Apr 2021 00:00:00 GMT

While I've been on the Internet for many years, one of the stumbling blocks I've found in making blogging a habit has always been finding ideas for content. I think I'm getting better at it, so here is what I've been doing.

Ali Abdaal asked on Twitter what people's common questions about starting a personal website were, and it turns out that finding content ideas is a pretty common problem.

Start with content

https://twitter.com/mrjamesbell/status/1379682648650440708

If at all possible try and find a few posts to import while you are setting it up and tweaking the design.

When we hired a professional web designer to redo our work website they insisted on having the content before they'd show us any design ideas. It was frustrating at the time, but once we went through the process it was clear what a difference it made.

We could see how things would come together and be presented, and it made the initial version of the website feel useful and "lived in" when it went live.

So, if you are starting from scratch, where you do find the content?

Write once, use often

The first thing I did when I started this website was to gather the various versions of blogs and articles I've written over the years.

While the angsty poetry of my early 20's can probably stay hidden, and I can't find the first website I ever made about the Hale Bopp Comet in 1994, I was happy to be able to find some content that gave my blog some structure.

Quite a few of my early blog posts have been based on Reddit posts or expanding on things I've written on Facebook.

This philosophy of "Write once, use often" was something I learned working in a corporate communications role. My journalist colleague called it "re-nosing". You can republish the same content on multiple platforms with only minor changes to the introduction or to the style.

The truth is most people won't see the content you post in every single location so not only is it a second chance to grab someone's attention, but it also allows you to reach different audiences but framing the content in different ways.

You'll see a lot of people doing this online by posting transcripts of podcasts or YouTube videos as blog posts, or shortened versions of blog posts as email newsletter content.

Document, don't create

In Ali's video he quotes Gary Vee's advice to "Document, not create". The idea being (at least when you are getting started) that you share what's happening in your life or things you've found rather than setting out to create totally brand new content.

I'm going to try this a bit more - perhaps posting one interesting thing I've seen each day online. Essentially this post was an excuse to save Ali's video for future reference but I've magically found myself expanding on the theme and creating a proper blog post.

In the future this will be a good way to remember the things I've seen online and found useful that's a bit more interactive than just collecting bookmarks (does anyone still bookmark things?)

Ali's video about making a personal website is on YouTube:

Watch on YouTube

My top 10 personal blog post ideas

Over the last few months I've collected a few drafts in Wordpress, and a folder of ideas in Ulysses that I'll use as the basis for blog posts. Even writing this post has given me ideas for future posts. Here are 10 personal blog content ideas that I've been thinking about that might inspire you:

Scan and post old school projects or writing. Don't forget to transcribe them for both SEO and accessibility.
Find emails where you've explained how to do something or documented your travel adventures and turn them into a travel diary
Post your go-to recipes. I 100% only did this so I can look up the cooking times when I need them
Play the "two truths and one lie" game as a blog post. Share it on social media so people can guess the lie.
Write a post about your first job, what you studied after school, a memorable birthday, your first concert or rank your favourite author's books
Brainstorm some random facts about yourself - each one of them can be expanded into a post in the future
Document your room, desk or the things you use each day. Ali does a great job of this on his blog, and its a great place to add affiliate links in the future if you go down that path
Make a list of your interests and then write an article about each one. What is it? Why do you like it? How do you get started, or are there some links you can share that beginners may find useful. This doesn't have to be hobbies - if you are into crime fiction suggest some good authors for beginners to check out.
Write about how you did a thing - started a blog? learned to ski? started a journal? met your partner? For anything you've done there will be someone who will find your story helpful
Write about your favourite local cafe, restaurant or bar. It forces you to reflect and explain why you like them which will improve your writing.

For each idea start a new document (it doesn't really matter where you write them so long as you can copy and paste into your blog platform later) and then flesh out the details when you are in the mood. As you get more ideas (and you will) start more documents.

Bonus Tip: Something I always enjoyed about jwz's website was the way he linked between posts - even with seemingly random words. It helped me discover more of his content and it's good for SEO too, if you care about that sort of thing.

My (unabridged) life in travel

Thu, 11 Mar 2021 00:00:00 GMT

In early 2021, I was invited to write about my life in travel as a way of promoting Shakespeare in the Park 2021. You can read the actual article on the NZ Herald website, but here are my answers in full.

What do you miss most about travel right now?

I love the thrill of arriving in a new city and having to figure things out. There’s a certain adrenaline rush to figuring out Shanghai’s subway to get to your hotel.

Where was the first overseas trip you ever took, and what are your strongest memories from it?

I’d been to the UK twice before I was five, but I only remember sitting on my father’s shoulders watching a Guy Fawkes bonfire.

I remember going on a family holiday to Sydney when I was very young. I wrote a story about it for school and won an award from the Principal.

What was a standard family holiday like when growing up?

My dad would travel quite a lot for work and the family (my brother and my mum) would sometimes tag along. Mostly around the North Island saying a motels. We'd explore the local town while my Dad went to work.

Who has most inspired your travels?

TV shows like MacGyver really inspired me to learn about different cultures. The TV series Intrepid Journeys absolutely convinced me that travel was something I could do too.

What is the greatest trip you’ve ever been on?

For Christmas 2018 I toured the Christmas market of Europe then headed to the northern tip of Norway to look for the Northern Lights. On new year’s eve I was sitting around a campfire on the Norway/Finland border as the clouds cleared and the lights began to move through the sky.

And the worst?

I spent three days in New York with a terrible head cold. I went to three Broadway shows and fell asleep at all of them. I would absolutely recommend visiting the United Nations if you are in New York. The tour is well worth it.

What’s your approach to packing for an overseas trip?

One carry-on bag only. I tend to pack and repack until my bag is as light as possible. I us a Go Ruck GR1 in Black and a NutSac Satchel as my day bag.

What is the destination that most surprised you – good or bad – and why?

Shanghai was young and vibrant and could easily have been New York or London. The brand new but empty apartment buildings and shopping malls fascinated me – it’s a city waiting for the people to arrive.

Where was your most memorable sunrise/sunset?

Riding a bike on top of the ancient city walls of Xi’an with a new friend. The atmosphere, the view and the company were perfect.

What’s the first thing you do when you get home from a long trip?

Hug my cat and make a proper cup of tea. The world’s inability to get an English Breakfast Tea right never ceases to amaze me.

What do you miss most about home when you travel?

My family and friends. And my cat (of course) but honestly things like Skype and Messenger have made the world a lot smaller and it doesn't take much effort to catch up for a video call either before or after a day of exploring.

Where is the one destination you must see before you die, and why?

Iceland is high on my bucket list, along with some notable sci-fi landmarks in the USA like Roswell and Area 51.

What’s your favourite thing about travel?

Figuring out how the streets in New York work, random strangers on a bus helping you find your destination in Beijing, nearly being arrested in Hong Kong. When you usually work at a desk you start to feel very much like Indiana Jones.

17 Random Facts About Me

Sun, 10 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMT

I was named after a Starship captain
I was detained at Hong Kong airport for suspected money laundering
I feature in a Chinese public service training video
I've seen more shows at the Globe than at the Aotea Centre
I've been inside the Great Pyramid of Giza
I went (indoor) rock climbing recently. It was fun.
I did a school science fair project about prime numbers
I was at work at midnight on 31 December 1999, and helped prevent Y2K disasters
I've walked on the Great Wall of China. You may have been able to see me from space
I'm more scared of planes taking off than landing
I don't like spiders, or flying insects
The first full-length play I ever directed was a Shakespeare
I like roadtrips
I've written three short film scripts and half a play
I've passed out having my blood pressure taken and I do not have blood tests
I like science and maths and read New Scientist
I can or could play the piano, clarinet and the guitar, with varying levels of skill.

The Mystrons

Thu, 07 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMT

When I was much younger I wrote an epic sci-fi graphic novel. Because talent like this should not be lost to time, I present in all it's glory - The Mystrons. (Not to be confused with The Mysterons - I assume there was some sort of copyright issue)

(With apologies to Gerry Anderson)

(I suspect NASA did not receive their copy.)

One day when I was putting the milk out I got (hit) by a laser beam. It hit my foot. I did cry. Some more came I hid behind the letter box. Then it stopped. I went back inside. I found that it came from the moon. I wondered how?

It was the next day. I saw a flying saucer. I tried to take a photo of it but when it was developed it was blank. I saw it again I tried to take a photo of it again but the same happened so I did not (try) it again. But then.......

The next day it landed on our drive when I was getting the paper. Then a voice said "This is the voice of the Mystrons"

A ramp came down. A man stepped out. He caught me. I shouted "help". Russell looked out of his window. He came to help but he got caught as well. They took us in

We bit them they bit us it hurt. They took us into a room and locked us up. The guards came in they came into the room. They left the door open . But if we moved they would shoot us with a gun you would (not) die. But if you moved again you would.

Then the Mystrons started to attack but when we attacked our bullets just blew up so we gave up. They landed and kidnapped everyone they could see.

Meanwhile, on earth they were getting ready to attack. When they were high they took us to the door and made us jump our of the door. The people on earth saw us but didn't do anything then they noticed who is was and they rescued us

Me and Russell were the only ones on earth because all over the world they were attacking. We ran to Whenuapai airport. We jumped into an Orion but did not know how to drive one we just guessed. We took off we rescued everyone and never landed again.

Notes

I’m not 100 per cent how old I was - 7 or 8 I think
The final page is drawn in crayon. I have no idea why
“Russell” was my next door neighbour.

How I Make Roast Beef

Sun, 27 Sep 2020 00:00:00 GMT

I like to cook, but sometimes I forget all the timings and numbers so I decided to blog about them. Honestly, there are probably better recipes on the internet for this sort of thing.

Assumes top side beef, around 750g

Sear beef in a frying pan, pre heat oven to 200
Season beef with oil, salt and pepper
Put the beef in the oven for 25 mins
Prepare veges – cut, wash, dry and season as above
After 25 mins add veges
Cook for another 15 mins
Turn veggies and check beef
Check every 10mins or so – when looking good remove the beef and leave to rest on a plate.
Turn down veges to 150 or so and continue until ready
You’re done

Nine 90’s “Hacker” movies you should watch

Sat, 13 Jun 2020 00:00:00 GMT

Seeing "Sneakers" on sale on Apple TV reminded me that there are some movies younger geeks might not know they should watch. So, here is a helpful list of 90's "hacker" movies to watch or not ordered by how much I like them.

Sneakers (1992) - Pen testing, social engineering, cryptography and lasers. What more could a teenage geek want? I could watch this 100 times and not get bored. Also, Cooties Rat Semen.

Office Space (1999) - Before Silicon Valley there was Office Space. Painfully true to life for anyone who has had a 'corporate' IT job.

The Matrix (1999) - Mind blowing for a young systems engineer. Everyone wanted the cool Nokia slide phone. This was perhaps one of the first times I'd seen a movie that presented "hackers" as cool.

War Games (1983) - Its a little bit pre-90s, but its really good. You may be surprised to learn it was written by the same screenwriter as Sneakers.

Disclosure (1994) - Its mostly gender politics set in a tech startup, but its pretty good. As with most movies based on Michael Crichton books, the book is better (see also: Jurassic Park)

Hackers (1995) - From what I remember its a lot of style over substance. Hacking into "The Gibson" etc. Give it a miss unless you are desperate.

(A lot of people on reddit disagree with me about this and upon rewatching it I suppose I can see the appeal)

The Net (1995) - Terrible movie but Sandra Bullock is hot. Fight me.

Antitrust (2001) Ryan Phillippe as a hacker. Not great.

Swordfish (2001) - Hugh Jackman was a hacker before he was Wolverine. Famous for that particular scene with Halle Berry.

Honourable Mentions:

The Manhattan Project (1986) - kid builds a nuclear bomb. While waking up from general anaesthetic I told a nurse I knew how to build a nuclear bomb on the basis of watching this movie. I was a special child.

Short Circuit (1986) - Sentient robot (but also kinda racist)

Code Rush (2000) - Documentary about Netscape open sourcing as Mozilla. Features the illustrious jwz.

Pirates of Silicon Valley (1999) - Biopic about Bill Gates and Steve Jobs starting out. I got a lifetime ban from our local Blockbuster because I refused to pay an overdue fine for this movie on the basis that I hadn't rented it from them. They closed two weeks later. Suck on that, Blockbuster.

I'm sure there are others but these are the ones that stick out.

This post was originally published on Reddit.

Seven beginner's thoughts on blogging with Jekyll

Thu, 23 Apr 2020 00:00:00 GMT

Themes are a nightmare. It’s a miracle they ever work

If you are lucky you can just copy the files in, but then you have to start messing around with Gemfiles and missing or duplicated _layout patterns and all sorts. I suppose attaching to Github is supposed to help with that? But that leads me to..

An obsession with Github

Yes, I know they are closely linked but it seems like you can't go five minutes without having to "git the clone repo master branch" (or a similar sort of foreign language that Git users probably understand)

You have to be reasonably comfortable with troubleshooting to make any real progress

This is especially true when your operating system doesn't behave like the tutorials say it will. I have no idea how many copies of Ruby I have installed now or where they live. I guess thats ok? Who knows.

Googling error messages is my friend again

So far I haven't had to look at Ruby code. This is a good thing

One of the things that put me off most static generators in the first place was the fanatical nature of the platform they are built on. Fortunately, like all good software, I can "use" Jekyll without needing to know how it works under the hood - so far anyway.

Local development and testing works well

Being able to play with things live on my local machine is lovely. And I haven't had to install a database!

Github hosting seems like it should be easier

Either I'm watching really complicated tutorials or getting static hosting working on Github Pages is like some kind of mysterious incantation. I haven't really looked into this yet so maybe its easier. It doesn't help that old tutorials come up but the actual process has been updated since they were published.

Yes, I am having FUN!¹

I used to install Linux on 386s and try and make winmodems and graphics cards work. So despite all my issues above, I am really enjoying tinkering with something and overcoming the challenges of making it go. I suspect that over time I'll figure out all my issues and actually have a website I'm happy with.

¹ I've since created a blog in Wordpress and migrated it to Bear. I like to tinker.

Working from home during a pandemic

Thu, 16 Apr 2020 00:00:00 GMT

With the sudden lock down of New Zealand due to Covid-19 I found rather quickly that I wasn’t really prepared to actually work from home.

Technology

Day to day at home i used a 13” Macbook Air, but its primarily a consumption device. I’d never really written anything of any length. It quickly become apparent I’d need a proper keyboard, mouse and monitor.

With all suppliers in lockdown I have to made do with what I already had to start with - an external Apple keyboard. Because it was old it come with a new challenge - USB only.

It worked for a while, but still found any serious writing or spreadsheet work to be quite difficult to do on such a small screen.

Fortunately, retailers were soon allowed to sell “essential” technology products by delivery, so I ordered:

A 21” monitor (with HDMI input)
USB-C to HDMI Cable
Basic wireless mouse

This combination actually worked really well, but I soon ran into USB-C limitations. I could have any combination of keyboard, monitor and power - but not all three.

After a bit of research I found a basic USB-C hub with passthrough power - this means I could run everything via one USB-C port.

So far its working well, and I’m slowing getting used to using both laptop screen and monitor at the same time. Usually I’ll put video conferencing on the smaller screen and whatever “work” I am doing on the larger screen.

I’d really like to go big-screen only but two things prevent this - my reliance on touch-id on the Macbook Air (who knew this would become a must-have feature) and the webcam for video calls.

At this stage I probably won’t some things on my wish list - a vertical stand for my laptop (in clamshell mode) or an external webcam - but its useful to know what I might need in the future.

Environment

I live with my flatmate in a relatively small two bedroom apartment. Most of of the shared livings spaces are taken up with her costume making supplies, so finding a space to sit and work was challenging.

Initially she cleared a space in her sewing room for me to use, but it got very hot after about 11:00 am (it was, after all , a conservatory), but more importantly was close enough to the shared areas that it proved distracting.

I rearranged by bedroom a little are repurposed a beautiful writing table I had used as a bedside table for its actual purpose - writing.

Its a little cramped with a monitor, keyboard, laptop and mouse, but it does the job.

I’m not in love with the idea of working in my sleeping space, but its has allowed me to be more productive.

The Right Way to Play a Scene

Sun, 22 Jun 2014 00:00:00 GMT

So many actors worry about the ‘right’ way to play a character or a scene.

They rush to a movie version or something they’ve seen on YouTube and copy it. But then you aren’t acting, you are doing the acting equivalent of karaoke.

In the short clip below Dave Grohl talks about how it learned to play drums and guitar not with lessons, but by figuring it out for himself.

Watch on YouTube

Next time you are worried about how to play a scene, be like Dave Grohl. Do it your way.

Kiwi Story Time

Thu, 20 Mar 2014 00:00:00 GMT

The NZ Herald published an article about Kiwi Slang, so I thought I’d try and use all of their examples in a sentence. I didn't quite mange it, but I did write a sweet as story.

In the original version some Australianisms crept in - I put this down to growing up with a neighbour who was originally from Australia - they used many of the Kiwi slang terms too, so they sort of all merged into one. I have re-edited the text to remove them in this version.

To be read in the style of Radio New Zealand story time.

A trip to the beach

Barry packed his bag for the trip to the bach. Looking forward to the sweet summer ahead, his pack was already chocka when he realised he had forgotten his togs and jandals.

He looked through the mess in his room, until he found both jandals under his bed where the dog had hidden them. He sighed looking at the tooth marks. They were totally munted.

Mum came back from the dairy, and Barry asked if they could take a tiki-tour past The Warehouse to buy some new jandals. Mum agreed, and off they went.

It wasn’t long before they were right out in the wop-wops, and Dad’s “rolls canardly” was starting to sound a bit suss.

“I’ll pull over up ahead and take a look, eh?” Dad said to Mum.

“Ok Luv,” Mum replied, not looking up from her cross-stitch.

The car rolled to a stop in a picnic area next to a small, inviting, beach.

Dad opened the bonnet and eyed the engine. “I reckon the radiator cap is a bit dodgy.” he said out loud, to no one in particular.

“Hey Barry,” Dad called, “Grab the bottle of water from the boot will ya.”

Barry slipped on his new jandals and stepped into the hot summer sun. He found the water bottle, and handed it to Dad.

“Ta” Dad said, as he used the bottom of his T-shirt to delicately remove the hot radiator cap.

A sudden burst of hot steam erupted from the radiator, engulfing Dad’s face. “Bugger!,” he yelled, staggering backwards.

Dad filled up the radiator with water and got back in the car. “I reckon we’ll need to give it a bit of time to cool down,” he said to Mum. “I might have a snooze.”

“Why don’t you go for a swim, Barry?” said Mum.

Barry was stoked. He grabbed his togs and towel, and set off tramping through the tall seaside grass towards the inviting clear water of the beach.

James Bell

Christmas and Lights Tour - Part One

Shanghai

Munich

Discovering Jean-Michel Jarre

If you unscrew your belly button, your bottom will fall off; and other things my Dad taught me.

If you unscrew your belly button, your bottom will fall off.

Your friends and acquaintances follow you everywhere you go

Your neighbours will indulge the craziest of schemes

Delegate

How to troll your cousin

In Summary

The most important thing interviewers are looking for in job interviews.

How to figure out what jobs you (might) like to do

1. Find all the jobs you like the sound of

2. Save and/or print your vacancies

3. Highlight the things that you like

4. Make a list

5. Divide your list in three

6. Find jobs that match

How to actually negotiate your freelance rate

Rule 1 - You are the expert.

The magic question

What if they avoid the question?

I can’t just keep doubling my rate though

Or, just give them a rate

Be your own boss

Discounts, testimonials and loss-leaders

In Summary

Help, someone just gave me flyers to give out!

If you are interested in computer programming

Quick Tip : How to remember how to do links in Markdown

How to find content for your personal blog

Start with content

Write once, use often

Document, don't create

My top 10 personal blog post ideas

My (unabridged) life in travel

17 Random Facts About Me

The Mystrons

Notes

How I Make Roast Beef

Nine 90’s “Hacker” movies you should watch

Seven beginner's thoughts on blogging with Jekyll

Themes are a nightmare. It’s a miracle they ever work

An obsession with Github

You have to be reasonably comfortable with troubleshooting to make any real progress

So far I haven't had to look at Ruby code. This is a good thing

Local development and testing works well

Github hosting seems like it should be easier

Yes, I am having FUN!1

Working from home during a pandemic

Technology

Environment

The Right Way to Play a Scene

Kiwi Story Time

A trip to the beach

Yes, I am having FUN!¹