TET.Life (The Extraordinary Tourist Life)

Maggie Beer's Farm Shop Entrance. You may know South Australian icon Maggie Beer from her TV cooking show, The Cook and the Chef , or from her guest appearances on Australian Master Chef . Or perhaps you're a long time customer of her various products and produce. If you're in the Barossa Valley region then a trip to her farm/shop/eatery is a nice way to spend a morning or afternoon. Follow the link to book an 'experience' that will make your visit extra memorable. The Farm Walk, informational Plaques. There is a farm walk trail, that my partner, Enigma, and I, found a little hard to know for sure if we were going the right way, but we seemed to find the various informative plaques detailing the site's history. In any case we also had a nice walk around the main lake that the shop sits alongside where you can spot many turtles and other water going wildlife. The shop itself isn't particularly large but it does have the full range of Maggie's products....

It's hard to imagine, that with all the trailers and leaks for Spider-Man: No Way Home that there were any surprises left to see in theatres. Fortunately the movie still manages to deliver even more than I was expecting. As a result, I had a great time and didn't leave the theatre feeling like I'd seen it all already in the trailers. This is, arguably, one of the best live action Spider-Man films (potentially even comic book superhero films) you'll ever see. That said, there's still much to question and discuss, about the plot, with things that kind of, but probably don't make sense upon further reflection, but there's so much good here, you'll cut the writers some slack (probably). The film picks up almost exactly where Spider-Man, Far From Home, left off, with Spider-Man's identity as Peter Parker being outed. This becomes a major issue for Peter, who seeks out Doctor Strange to see what he can do to reverse time to a point before his identity bec...

Goat Square Artwork by Rod Schubert, 2008.   After almost travelling to Perth Western Australia my partner, Enigma and I, decided to take a short getaway to the Barossa for three days over her birthday. In a grueling twenty minute drive, in which I almost had time to ask "Are we there yet?" we arrived at our destination, Goat Square Cottages, Tanunda, South Australia. Consisting of three adjoined cottages for up to eight guests, Goat Square Cottages are thought to be one of the oldest houses in the Barossa Valley, dating back to the late 1840s or very early 1850s. Its layout and stylings are likely influenced (and probably built) by German migrants who moved to the region at the time. A restful seating spot at Goat Square Cottages. Built around Goat Square, or Ziegenmarket (in German), the name comes from the custom of early settlers tethering their goats in the square. In terms of accommodation we stayed in Kavel Cottage, at the rear of the building next to the carpark. The ...

I have always been an MCU Hawkeye fan. I think it kind of sucks that Jeremy Renner's character gets all the jokes as the least effective Avenger when Black Widow is similarly underpowered. Though I do like the eleven arrow joke Renner did during a special guest appearance on Saturday Night Live. So great that he not only sees the humor but leans into it as well. What I like about Clint Barton is that he's simply a reliable worker who usually gets the job done, without fanfare or any need to be in the spotlight... and most of the time eleven arrows is enough! I feel his character, until the new Hawkeye Disney+ series was best summed up by the scene in Avengers, Age of Ultron, where he gives Wanda the speech about being an Avenger. Speaking of the Hawkeye Disney+ series, after just two episodes, Kate Bishop is my new second favorite Avenger (even though she's not actually an Avenger yet). Hailee Steinfeld's performance as the character is amazing. She really sells that Ka...

Flying over WA 2007 trip. Booking any kind of cross border travel in today's not quite post COVID-19 world is a bit of a gamble. Almost a month ago my partner and I booked airfares to travel from South Australia to Western Australia for a five day holiday to attend a 70th birthday, visit family I hadn't seen since 2016, and so my partner could spend her birthday in one of our favorite places, Fremantle. We booked the tickets because the week before they were half the price we paid, and we didn't want to hold off any longer in case the price went up yet again to a potentially unaffordable amount. In the meantime all the state governments of Australia were making plans for when to reopen their borders to general travel, based upon the number of fully vaccinated people in each state. SA settled on 80% fully vaxxed before we would open our border to states that were still battling COVID-19 lockdowns, primarily New South Wales and Victoria. While I decided to get myself fully va...

Based on the early reviews I was expecting this movie to be just fine. While it's the worst rated Marvel movie to date it's a bit like saying plain chocolate is the worst chocolate. There may be better chocolates out there but it's still chocolate. While Eternals does slow down a little through the middle with quite a few dialogue heavy scenes, overall it's still a solid movie that held my attention all the way through. I kind of suspect it'll be a little like Thor The Dark World , the previous contender for worst Marvel movie. More people will start to come around on re-watches as we see how the events of this film affect the wider MCU going forward. The basic story is that the Eternals have been tasked with keeping humans safe from some fairly horrendous creatures, known as Deviants over thousands of years. Having completed their task many years ago the Eternals have been living on Earth awaiting further direction, when suddenly Deviants begin to appear again. I ...

I actually saw Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings in theatres a few weeks ago and only just now realized I never wrote a review. So, in the interest of being a Marvel completionist, here's my late review of the film. The basic storyline is Shang-Chi, now known a Shaun (Simu Liu), seemingly an average guy with a regular job in San Francisco, is forced to confront his past when his criminal underworld father (Tony Chiu-Wai Leung) and leader of the Ten Rings Organization seeks to bring him back into the fold. The one thing that really stood out for me in this movie is that it is definitely not the movie I thought I was getting based on the trailers, which make it look like a straight forward, Marvel origin story. It is so much more than that, but at the same time, I don't really want to tell you about it in any great detail, because it was quite amazing to discover there was more to this world than I expected. At the same time I was pleased to see that some of the flash bac...

You may have heard about NFTs and understand them to be a way for individuals to own the original copy of a digital image, most commonly an artwork. For the most part your understanding is correct, except it's not actually the digital image you own as such, it's the right to be recognized as the owner of that image by absolute proof of ownership through purchasing it as a non duplicatable NFT. An NFT, or Non-fungible Token, can be linked to any media, not just art. Any kind of digital file. They can even be linked to physical media (possibly less common but I've seen it done). NFTs are a piece of data stored as a digital ledger entry, using blockchain technology, similar to that used by cryptocurrencies, but every ledger entry represents a unique item. You don't need to understand blockchain technology other than it's what makes it possible for you to be the actual owner of a digital file in the same way an art collector can be the actual owner of an original Da Vin...

Image by Paul Birman from Pixabay It's 2021 and, with the pace of technology, you're ready to upgrade to a second generation flying car. Unfortunately a trip to your local car dealer doesn't go as planned because flying cars in 2021 still aren't a thing. One wonders, if Elon Musk wasn't so focused on space travel, would we have flying Tesla cars by now? Hopefully that may be his next big push considering he's pretty close to fully self driving cars - technology that is probably essential if flying cars are to work in urban environments. When I last checked in on the state of flying car development in my post from 2017, Revisiting the 'Flying Car' - How Close Are We? the focus was very much on drone/quadcopter configurations, with nothing you could really call a 'car'. Unfortunately we haven't really progressed from there. The closest we have to a consumer model flying car is the Jetson One , which was launched in October of this year. Made ...

Leonardo the walking drone/quadcopter robot that skateboards and slacklines. Leonardo is a small, prototype that is half quadcopter drone and half bipedal, walking robot. While the robot, called Leo for short, can both walk and fly what makes it unique is that it uses its quadcopter system for stability, even while walking. This gives it greater balance, allowing it to perform more unique capabilities like skateboarding and slacklining. Leo's name is derived from the phrase 'LEgs ONboARD drOne', and is the creation of Professor Soon-Jo Chung and his team from the Aerospace Robotics and Control Lab at Caltech , California. Their goal for Leo is to develop a kind of all terrain drone/robot that could feasibly perform both aerial and ground tasks in less than ideal conditions. Which doesn't sound quite as cool as saying we built a robot that can fly, skateboard and walk a slackline. Youtube channel Veritasium showcased Leo in their video below. Is it weird that my first t...

By ;Jerryhattric - Flickr : wizard's wishes , CC BY-SA 2.0 , Link Firstly, kudos to UK born, Ian Brackenbury, who some how managed to be paid USD$11,300 annually to be Christchurch's official Wizard for the last 23 years. Probably one of the most unconventional local  government jobs out there but it gives everyone hope that dream jobs can become a reality.  I mean, if you asked anyone pre 1998 that Christchurch City Council would employ an official Wizard for even a year, you'd probably get told you were dreaming. Interestingly enough 1998 is pre New Zealand becoming 'Middle Earth' in Peter Jackson's highly acclaimed movies based on Tolkien's books, The Lord of the Rings. Though I'm sure they did a lot to keep Ian on the payroll for so many years as a living tourist attraction of the city (yeah, if you thought he worked in the engineering department or something you were way off). The city council has decided to let their wizard go as part of 'mo...

I don't know if Paul Hogan agreed to do this just for the pay check, or he was just too busy calling in favors for all the cameos to maybe do a rewrite of the script, but Hoges almost puts Bruce Willis to shame in how phoned in his performance feels in The Very Excellent Mr. Dundee . Which is a real shame because the premise of the movie looked very appealing when I first saw the trailer (it's taken me this long to get Amazon Prime Video so I could watch the film). The Very Excellent Mr. Dundee will make you wish even more this pretend movie trailer was a real film. This movie actually makes you wish even more that Tourism Australia's Dundee - The Son of a Legend Returns Home was a real movie (better writing, better cinematography, better cameos of actors in actual roles, not just playing themselves). In The Very Excellent Mr. Dundee Paul Hogan plays a fictional version of himself very loosely based on his actual life, in the sense that he's been out of the celebrity s...

When the Doom Patrol made their TV debut in the first series of Titans , and I later heard they were getting a spin off series, I was interested. However the series wasn't available in Australia for quite some time (or at least it was a while before I had access to a streaming service that had it) so I've been making my way through the first two seasons. Currently I'm almost halfway through season two. Everyone I've heard talk about this show seems to love it with phrases like "It's so good" being quite common. My expectations were that I'd at least like it. I mean everyone says it's SO good. At this point I'm still waiting for it to be just a little bit good in terms of the story. The show itself looks great. I like the cast. I'm not familiar with the comic so I had no preconceived notions of any characters. The actors all seem well cast to me and are great with the material they're given. I even like the surrealist concepts like Dann...

That Fella Down Under Floor Pillow by TET. Click Here for T-shirts and more... Overwhelmed by the historic nature of announcing a trilateral security partnership with Britain and Australia, called Aukus, in which the US is going to share nuclear technology that will help Australia create a multibillion-dollar fleet of nuclear-powered submarines, President Joe Biden clearly forgot our Prime Minister's name. Fortunately he improvised with "that fella down under" and nobody noticed his momentary brain fart. Or so he probably thought. Far from being offended, I'm sure many Australians remember fondly a time when Scott Morrison's name was synonymous with the statement "I think he's the Treasurer?" Nobody could actually be sure as the revolving door on who was leading the country at that time was still moving at quite a pace. "That fellow down under," Scott Morrison To be fair, I'd struggle to remember the name of a man who's biggest ac...

Sorelle Amore. It's the million dollar question for many people wanting to start a business who feel they don't have the knowledge, money, skills, time, or all four, "How do I start from nothing?" If that's something you want to know too then the video below by  Sorelle Amore , an Australian photographer and social media entrepreneur success story, who is most known for literally writing the book on how to take an #AdvancedSelfie, has an answer well worth considering. Just in case you feel advice from a professional selfie photographer couldn't possibly be meaningful Sorelle's journey to financial freedom in just two years is well worth looking into. One takeaway for me is that at age 28 she was broke, but turned things around and was a millionaire by age 30. While that's an exceptional result of quite a lot of hard work, writing books, building courses, and more, what it says to me is, it's possible to be financially secure in less than two years ...

The Tesla Bot. Elon Musk recently launched a robotics concept, the Tesla Bot, that would've been amazing except it was little more than that, a concept. As of writing this there is very little information on Tesla's website about the project, and Elon himself didn't really elaborate much in his very awkward launch presentation. I'm pretty sure he was winging it given how bad it was. However he did say they expected to have a prototype in about a year. While the concept definitely has its critics (who see humanoid robots as highly inefficient), the general idea is to create a robot that can adapt to and perform any task an actual human could do. Not unlike the robots in the movie iRobot . I don't doubt that, if anyone can make something that looks like the Tesla Bot concept, it's Tesla and Elon Musk. Tesla has been working on artificial intelligence (A.I.) systems for quite some time, most notably in their development of self driving cars. While their autonomous ...

When I first saw the trailer for Free Guy over a year ago (a month or so before the worldwide pandemic hit) I thought it looked a lot of fun. Then when films started opening in cinemas again, after having their release dates pushed back a year or more, I thought Free Guy was the movie that would most likely get people going back to the movies. Though it was never really tested, since other movies have opened before it during the pandemic, it is doing particularly well at the box office with a strong second week's takings (where most other films have experienced quite large drops in the second week). I'm speculating but I think Ryan Reynold's ability to market anything, including this film, in a way that you look forward to watching his campaigns, has brought people in, then word of mouth on how fun the film is, has been working well. The film centers on Guy (Ryan Reynolds), a non player character (NPC) in a violent video game world, who doesn't actually know he's i...

TET with Monkey Pizza Lifeline Skateboard. It's been a long time since I posted any video to my Extraordinary Tourist YouTube Channel . Approximately seven to eight months. This is because a year or to back I pivoted the channel into documenting my skateboarding progress, relearning my former skills, and then stopped skating due to pain occurring in both my feet. In the channel update video below I go into it in more detail but the short version is, I started to get pain in the top of both my feet, probably due to ongoing impact stress of skateboarding rather than any specific injury, coupled with very sharp, momentary pain between my toes of my back, 'pop', foot. I decided it was probably best to rest both my feet by not skateboarding for a while. While the pain was ongoing it didn't affect my ability to walk, only skateboarding seemed to aggravate it. I didn't expect to be not skating for this long. While my front foot has healed completely, my back, 'pop'...

Pearl Gibbs, 1901-1983. Photo: State Library of New South Wales It's increasingly disappointing to me just how much Australian Indigenous history I don't know. For example, if you were to ask me who Rosa Parks is, I'd be able to tell you she was an American, Black Civil Rights activist who is most known for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white person back in the 1950s. However, if you were to ask me who is Pearl Gibbs , until very recently, I would've given you a blank stare. If it weren't for Google, honoring her 120th birthday (18 July 2021) with a Google Doodle during this year's NAIDOC Week (typically held in July annually as a celebration of the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.), I'd still be non the wiser. While Pearl Gibbs doesn't have a single defining moment of her activism that would shoot her to national fame, like Rosa, non the less, she was equally as active in the civil rights...