Barry’s Five Rules of International Travel

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  1. I will not eat anything rated higher than 1,000 on the Scoville scale during the 24 hours preceding take-off
  2. I will do everything in my power to avoid police attention in countries where they write in their own special alphabet
  3. In countries where security guards routinely carry machine guns, I will not carry anything more valuable than a machine gun
  4. I will not attempt to upgrade the OS on my laptop, nor the firmware on my iPod, iPad, iPhone, or iAnything during the 24 hours preceding take-off
  5. I will not attempt to use superglue on the day that I am due to fly

That is all.

Oh, snap

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You know when you attempt to walk past the fridge, but you catch your little toe on the corner, and you collapse in agony, curling into a foetal ball and whimpering, convinced that your toe is at the very least broken, and possibly entirely severed from your foot?

And then you look down, through the tears and anguish, and see that actually it’s fine, and you’re just being a big girl?

Well, this was a bit like that. Apart from the “actually it’s fine” part.

What I expected to see
What I expected to see
What I expected to see
What I actually saw


I had always wanted to break a bone. In doing so, I had finally fulfilled both of my medical ambitions (the other was to take a ride in an ambulance). Unlike the ambulance ride, this was less fun than I had anticipated.
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Linode Kernel Check

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[Update: Linode changed their data format on 3 August 2011 which broke this script - it has now been amended.]

[Update 2: And again on 22 August 2011. Amended again.]

I host this site on a Linode, because it’s like having my own dedicated server, running whatever distro I like (Debian, in my case), for twenty bucks a month.

One of the many advantages of Debian is its insanely awesome package management. However, one of the very few disadvantages of running a Linode as opposed to a real dedicated server, is that your kernel package is managed from outside the VM, rather than within.
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The Drums live in Bangkok

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I hadn’t heard much of their music, although I knew the name. That’s one of the problems with being an expat in Asia – you become completely disconnected from the music scene of the West, particularly anything that could possibly be construed as “indie”.

A slideshow to illustrate my realisation of precisely why professional music photographers do not use their iPhones for gig photography. Photoset here.

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Penang & Langkawi

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The archipelago of Langkawi had come recommended by a few people, all of whose identities are now lost in the mists of time. I do know that after I booked the trip, I asked the people who I thought had recommended it for tips. Responses included “Never been there. Looks nice though”, “Yes, I went there but never left the resort, so can’t recommend anything”, “No, I was going to go but didn’t”, and of course “I think there were monkeys, but I was drunk”.

There are too many sunset photos
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