Alternative work hours

5 days a week really isn't working for me. Says me, here at work on Saturday.

I'd like to propose some alternatives:

1) 5 - 6 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Working just 5 hours a day means they can be top quality, from a productivity point of view. Obviously some of those days would need to be home-based, to reduce travel time and impact on family life.

2) 10 hour days, 4 days a week.

Get work over and done with, with a longer recovery period. Minimise "set-up time" involved with preparing and travelling. A day where I work "9 to 5" is already shot, so the 50% increase in recovery/leisure time more than compensates for the 2 nearly worthless hours on weeknights.

3) 12 hours days, 3 days a week.

Variant of number 2, obviously suitable only for some types of work. For me, if I could work Midday to midnight or 3pm to 3am, I find that so much easier than getting up in the mornings.

Thinking about it, I'm going to try #2 by stealth. If I knock off 2 to 4 hours early on Friday afternoon, I find that it's almost as good as a 3 day weekend. And it's not hard to work the required 38 hours in 4.5 days.

Ripped off on Ebay!

I can't believe it. I'm sure this never happens.

Anyway, to the person who opened a Commonwealth Bank account in the name of "Homan Ghahramanian", and ebay id Rayed2005, thanks for ruining my Valentine's Day. Hope you feel good.

Curiosity got the better of me...

I decided that, against all instructions and dire warnings to the contrary, that I should pull apart the VB Boonanza Boony to see how he works.

Witness the results:














The inner workings (above). Large black object is speaker, small silvered cylinder appears to be a microphone. A few capacitors.

Batteries:














Three AAA's. Cheapies, with mercury and cadmium.



Bad photo of top side of circuit board:
















Close-up of printing. Ocean Unicorn appears to be a Hong Kong based electronics designer.

















Underside of circuit board:

















Presumably one of the chips is a timer, one holds the audio.... maybe there's an amplifier and power rectifier. If I feel the need to procrastinate I'll look up the chip serial numbers. Please email if you have done it.


You'll be please to know that when I re-assembled Boonie he works as well as ever. So much for following the instructions. :)