Just wondering if I should change the name of the blog – but hey sod it 🙂
Really starting to settle in now. My Dad is still here with me, and the wonderful thing about that is that he does all the cooking, the cleaning and goes looking for places for me to live…. fantastic! So I now have a flat.
The flat is in a high-rise appartment building just down the road from my current (see the google map below) corporate appartment. It’s right by the station and right in the middle of the CBD (Central Business District) .
With Dad here I’ve not had time to myself to really think about it, and we’re chatting at least twice a day, but I’m a bit worried that when Dad goes, I’ll be left to stew in my own thoughts… and generally that’s not a good place to be. I’ll have to find something to distract me… perhaps morning meditation from 5am and then rugby practice every night! View Larger Map
This post has taken a little longer to get up due to a wonderful WordPress upgrade that borked one of my plugins and stopped me being able to log in. The wonderful people at Dreamhost however helped me fix it.
So I’ve made it to Oz – in one piece – which was as big a surprise to me as it may be to you. After three weeks on the road to Russia and back and a short amount of time back in blightly before I had to dash out here I was a bit worried I’d miss something, but so far so good.
Melbourne is amazing – there’s a bunch of photos on my flickr stream – but wow what a city. I loved London so much – but this place, frankly is better. Well it is at the moment 🙂
I’ll spend some more time, when I’ve settled in, writing some more about the areas I’ve been to and what-not now the site is fixed.
If you want to get in touch with me – remember I’m 10 hours ahead – drop me a note or skype me on matthewcashmore
…. I never thought I’d say those words again, after one brief stint (18 months) a couple of years ago, I found I missed the rather amazing atmosphere and creative people.
There’s lots that can get on your nerves about the BBC (generally it’s finance), but none of that stops it being one of the most amazing places to work in the world, it’s easily the best place to work in the UK – and therein is the problem.
There was frankly no-one in the UK that could have got me out of the beeb, not with buckets of cash and technology that would have made me cry… but then along came Lonely Planet and devised a role that I simply had to go for, and thankfully have got!
So from the start of October I’ll be the new Innovation Ecosystem Manager for Lonely Planet based out of Melbourne in Australia – it’s all rather cool 🙂
The people who wrote in to the BBC Trust to complain about Top Gear showing an image of a frost bitten willy, and showing Jeremy Clarkson and James May enjoying a glass of rather nice booze as they drove to the North Pole (get that – they were driving to the North Pole – in a car – showing how comfortable it was to do so and that you didn’t in fact need to do it with a dog sled – which is hard) should be banned from watching TV.
We should be able to revoke peoples Sky Subscriptions, remove their freeview boxes and ask politely for the return of their TV License.
Seriously folks. It was funny, it wasn’t dangerous, and it was editorially justified. Get over yourselves.
Mashed – it’s Hack Day time again and this year we’ve got a corker of a weekend planned.
Arrive on the Saturday morning and listen to real people from the development world showing you how to build things and how to use the systems that will be available to you through-out the weekend – including a full broadcast TV station with the ability to build and hack your own interactive applications.
As the talks draw to a close the 24 hour hack begins – there’s plenty of food (no it’s not all pizza this year – think pie and mash) – distractions for when you need them and if all goes to plan a special event at midnight.
Sunday plods on to the live presentations at 2pm – hosted by a very very special guest star… if you thought last year was a great time – this year we’ll blow your socks off.
It’s all about you, if you want something let us know and we’ll organise it.
The first 100 tickets have gone live – you can sign up at –http://mashed08.eventbrite.com/Â – I’d be quick though – last year the first 100 tickets went in a little over two hours… we’ll be releasing more tickets next week via the partners, but get in early if you want to guarantee your spot!
Choosing a tent to take overland is never an easy task, do you go for weight? What about material? Cost? All very important questions, but ultimately I think it boils down to how you work with the tent and how it works for you in return.
I know, slightly strange to be talking about forming some sort of bond with something as silly as a tent, but after all this small, insubstantial shelter is going to be your home for the next goodness knows how long, why not take some care in what you chose? Why not take into account how you feel about your home?
With that in mind may I introduce the first tent that has made me feel something about how it’s put together – the Coolabah swag bag from Burke and Wills – distributed in this country by www.theaussieshop.co.uk
It’s completely made of canvas, both it’s best and worst point. I remember when I was a kid camping with my dad, a massive six person tent that took up the entire rear of the car, and took about a week to put up. It smelt bad when it rained, if it rained for more than a couple of hours you’d get a fine mist working its way through the material. But it seems even with the oldest tent material in the world we can have a bit of an update.
I couldn’t tell you exactly what it is, but it’s more ‘waxy’ and even though I’m yet to test it in the wet I can quite believe the claim from Burke and Wills that once it’s been wet, the seams expand and it’ll deal with everything but the worst of the weather. They suggest before you use it you take it out and give it a good hosing. Makes sense.
It’s certainly a ‘choice’, once I’d decided that I didn’t want to take a tent that took a lot of time to put up, and decided that I didn’t need a tent that I could get changed in etc, then the one man options became more sensible, the problems as ever boiled down to how you get in and out when it’s raining and where do you sit if it rains.
I’ve looked at a lot of one and two man tents, but all the modern ones just seem to be far to complicated. I’ve been looking for something that I can pull off the back of the bike un-roll and get in – complete with sleeping mat and bag. With the Coolabah I’ve finally found it. It ships with a foam mattress that frankly I’d be comfortable with as my main bed, but practically it’s just too big and doesn’t roll to a sensible size. I’ve now replaced that with my Exped Downmat (from Traveldri-Plus) and my sleeping bag – it now rolls up to half the size but it’s still fairly wide. If you’re on a narrow bike with no panniers you may struggle to find a way to fit it on. My bike, just like me, is quite wide and with 54 litre panniers on either side this isn’t going to cause me a problem.
The attention to detail is superb. As you get into the tent through the very accessible top door and put your head on the pillow you notice immediately how well put together it is, how close all the stitching is and how good the material is. I was very impressed when I saw a handy little loop for my torch and a series of pockets just above my shoulder for those little things like phones and glasses. I was slightly concerned about storage for things like my camera, but actually there’s so much room down by your feet that I stowed both my stills and video camera there without noticing them during the night.
There’s enough space inside to comfortably move around during the night and even change your undies and put some trousers on, but putting a top on is a bit difficult and you’ll need to poke your head out to achieve the more space conscious dressing activities.
Watch the video review.
The design is perfect, rather than the usual crawling into your tent you use a door on the top of the tent, very coffin like. In reality this means you can lie down and look out at the stars, either directly or through the mosquito net before pulling the canvas door over your head for a totally dark night. There is a door at the very end you can crawl through – but frankly – I don’t fit – I do like the fact you can leave the canvas on the end open with the net down however.
In summary, a great tent, very well made and once you’ve pulled out the supplied foam mattress and replaced it with a more sensible version just right for putting up each night very quickly. The only issues are with the size once rolled up – if you can deal with that and can find a sensible way to cover yourself in the rain (think tarp and poles off your bike) then go for it.
I have zero will power and have been lusting after one of these for a while now – so a combination of BA canceling my flight to Nice and the wonderful people at PC World in Terminal 5 having them in stock have resulted in me finally purchasing a baby blue model.
It’s really quite cute – first thoughts are that the keyboard is going to take some getting used to and I have to find a better way to upload photos to Flickr.
Really starting to settle in now. My Dad is still here with me, and the wonderful thing about that is that he does all the cooking, the cleaning and goes looking for places for me to live…. fantastic! So I now have a flat.
The people who wrote in to the 
With that in mind may I introduce the first tent that has made me feel something about how it’s put together – the Coolabah swag bag from Burke and Wills – distributed in this country by www.theaussieshop.co.uk
The attention to detail is superb. As you get into the tent through the very accessible top door and put your head on the pillow you notice immediately how well put together it is, how close all the stitching is and how good the material is. I was very impressed when I saw a handy little loop for my torch and a series of pockets just above my shoulder for those little things like phones and glasses. I was slightly concerned about storage for things like my camera, but actually there’s so much room down by your feet that I stowed both my stills and video camera there without noticing them during the night.
In summary, a great tent, very well made and once you’ve pulled out the supplied foam mattress and replaced it with a more sensible version just right for putting up each night very quickly. The only issues are with the size once rolled up – if you can deal with that and can find a sensible way to cover yourself in the rain (think tarp and poles off your bike) then go for it.
