Hiro Protagonist

If you wanted to play with currency, you just do a straight currency exchange. Buy American dollars (at parity) and wait for the AUD to go down and then change the money back to australian cash when the exchange rate is low. No need to put money into the American share market.

I agree that it can help build up your credit rating. It can also go against you as well. A lender might see that you have a $5000.00 limit on a credit card and ask you to have the limit lowered to say $2000.00 before they give you a loan for a car. I've seen this happen. Once you do have that credit card. It's really important to pay on time. What the banks don't tell you is that for every late payment, a point is marked against you. Too many points against you and you have a bad credit rating. And if you want your bad credit rating to be wiped, you pretty much have to hand in your credit cards, wait about 5 or 7 years depending where you live and start over again.

I only use debit cards which I have three as I have three bank accounts. One account where my pay goes in from my normal job, another account for my investment property and the third account is linked to my home loan and ebay account. The last time I used a credit card was around 1995/96. I would never use them again. I find it easier to keep everything separate to manage my finances, instead of throwing everything into one account. I think it's easier to get into debt with a credit card than using a debit card. I found I was able to save more using a debit card. I found there was a never ending vicious cycle with credit cards in having to pay them off and them using them again, month after month and getting nowhere financially.

This show is a train wreck. Hiro goes back to save Charlie who only appeared in 3 episodes from Season 1 (eps. 8, 9, 10)? I guess he's going to go back to the present and get Peter to save her? Who knows. I don't know where this is going.

I'm just saying, even thirty years ago, it was inconceivable for most people to believe that they would be using a device smaller than a packet of cards that can take thousands of photos, play hundreds of music tracks and videos, record home movies and talk to anyone around the world with. It was the stuff of Sci-Fi at the time. I agree with what Gorth said, "Which is why completely new thinking is required... As long as there are people who think we are limited by the speed of light, we will be limited by it."

I bet people a hundred years from now will laugh at the theories people are discussing today. No pick at anyone in particular, just saying what we know now compared to a hundred years ago.. it would look like magic if people even 30 years ago could see what was possible today.

Even though we see this from the viewpoint of the Cylons (and yeah, I thought it was funny that all of the cylons hidden in the fleet failed miserably), I would have liked to have seen more of the Origin of the Cylons. I wanted to see the Cylon homeworld or homeworlds. How they evolved. Where the original five came from (it was touched on in the series) and their story. The original five's motivations. Why the Cylons chose to attack, and why now. I want to learn the Cylon choices and motivations and psychology. etc. Maybe the new series Caprica will address some of this?

We just need someone to build a Tachyon Computer.

I remember when the BIS boards were closed and we went over to the IPLY boards and some IPLY staff member started banning people on the first few days. There was a bit of an uproar over that guy.

I wouldn't mind a computer that runs at the speed of light.

I quite enjoyed it. My only gripe is that it wasn't long enough. Hopefully, they'll do another BSG movie to further tie up more loose ends. Dean Stockwell's character Cavill is one cold hearted killer. Really showed the true side of him in this movie.

Knowing. Interesting movie. It felt like it was two movies in one or it was a movie it didn't know what it wanted to be. 2/3 of the movie was like Horror/Supernatural and the last 1/3 was Sci-Fi. Despite this, I did like the ending.

Just watched Battlestar Galactica - The Plan. It's good to see how everything started and where all the major characters were before and after the Cylons attacked and how those characters positioned themselves in the series. It was also good how they brushed over different episodes of the series and tied up a lot of loose ends. It also puts a different view on things, especially certain characters like Sharon valerii (Boomer). It's like they had two camera units filming the series and kept the film of the second camera unit of the Cylons viewpoint away until now. Watching the series again in the veiwpoint of the cylons was really interesting. Great Stuff.

A pretty ordinary episode with a good cliffhanger leading into the next episode. I was wondering why the next episode was called Light before seeing this one, now I know.

^ I really do think you need to watch every episode for all the sub plots. It's one of those shows where you miss an episode, you miss quite a bit.

^ I have ADSL2+ and where I am they turn the speed down in off-peak periods (2.30am - 8.00am), so now I can only download about 15 GB in that time period. Unfortunately, they do have a cap every month and once you exceed it, they throttle your speed down to dialup. The good thing is they don't count uploads which is great and no excess charges. Most ISPs here count uploads as well as downloads to your monthly usage.

My suggestion would be to buy a place which is cheap (not too cheap!), do some small renovations to add value to the place and which you think will go up quite a bit in price in ten years time. My girlfriend bought a 2 bedroom apartment 10 years ago for $220K, paid it off in around 6 years, renovated the kitchen $8000.00 which made it look very modern and put in floating floorboards $7000.00, did some painting inside and used Tile paint on the bathroom (most people can't see the Tile paint) and sold it recently for $400K as it looked liked a brand new apartment that was built yesterday. The only thing that gave it away was the outside of the building, which didn't look 'modern' but still looked good. $15K in renovations was a great investment for a 30 year old unit. Brand new units in the same area were going for $410K. Without the renovations, she might have only got $320K, maybe 340K. Prior to her buying this apartment, the real estate agent could sell it because it looked awful inside, but the building outside was great. She bought it not for what it looked like but for the location. It was the highest apartment in the street, top floor on a 2 level building, and had waterviews. She said, you never buy a place for what it looks like inside, it's always location and you can always change the inside. Whether it's a house or apartment, I think it's best to buy something that's already been built and then you can do some small renovations with modern stuff, like a new kitchen, bathroom, light fittings, etc. Some things to remember though. Things that always add value are: New Kitchen, New Bathroom (or use Tile Paint) with a bathtub (never get rid of the bathtub), built in wardrobe. Because when women and wives inspect the apartment/house, that's what they look at first.

^ I agree with everything with what theslug said. I would never buy a gutted house. Even if you buy a house and do 'small renovations' can be a headache. My girlfriend and I are doing major renovations to our house at the moment (ripped the carpet out and polished the floor boards, new bathroom, new second smaller bathroom, new kitchen, new master bedroom wardrobe, repaint the whole inside of the house, etc) and I'm doing about a third of the work and we've already gone through and sacked 2 lots of tradesmen and on our third tradesman now who is pretty good. After two weeks, Carpet was ripped out, floors polished, walls painted in lounge room, and bedrooms. The Kitchen, toilet and bathroom were all ripped out, kitchen cabinets, tiles, bath tub, shower, toilet, etc. And we didn't have a toilet for two weeks! Had to drive up to the 24hr McDonalds to go to the toilet. After two weeks we had a plumber put in a temporary toilet but still no shower. I had to go to work 1/2 an hour early Mon-Fri and have a shower at work. The girlfriend went to one of her friends places to have a shower. After the last 5 weeks of stuffing around with previous tradesmen, we're still nowhere near finished. There are too many idiots that don't know what they're doing and just stuff around all day, or do half jobs and go onto something else instead of finishing what they started. I don't know how many times I came home from work and saw something was started and not finished and the tradesman had started on something else. At the moment, we have our fridge and a small portable gas stove in the laundry and that's where we eat our meals. Kitchen was delivered yesterday and will be installed tomorrow. The bathroom was finished last week. Thank God! Small bathroom will be finished probably this weekend too. And we even haven't looked at doing the home office and the timber deck out back which will be the last thing we do. Also, I have to do the landscaping and gardening as well. The girlfriend said she will never buy a house again where we have to do major renovations. Small renovations might be okay, but major ones are a nightmare. Too much stress.

Fortunately, with comprehensive insurance in Australia, it doesn't matter whether you're at fault or not, the insurance company pays for the damage. My girlfriend has had two accidents (unfortunately her fault) in the last year and no problems whatsoever. Just took if to the panebeaters and they did all the insurance work. She only had to pay the standard excess (around $500.00 iirc). All up in damages with the two accidents combined was about $10K damage.

I believe because you owe it to the welfare of others less fortunate since you were given a better chance then others in society and it was society on top of perhaps the luck of a genetic lottery to what parents you were born to, either of which you had no choice of deciding, thus its not because of you that you became who you are but that your a product of genes and society. Nature and Nurture. It kind of suggests we are all connected, we are blank slates to some degree, some parents are richer then others, ect... Not that I back it or not. Im just sharing this idea. Good question. I thought most Americans only care about themselves and no one else. Why should an American care about someone else because they didn't pull up their bootstraps or Bra straps? Suck it up or put your big girl panties on! As the saying goes. If you want to have a pity party, then please ask for a table for one in the no-joking section because no one wants to be around you if you can't get ahead in life and be successful. My father pulled himself up by his bootstraps and earns over $200K a year and worked all his life to get where he is! He's a Plumber and runs a successful Small Plumbing business, but you want small business to be taxed and according to you my dad is rich and should give his money to those who are poor. Well boo hoo, because this is America and if you're born into poverty, with a disability, etc, then that's your problem, not mine! /stereotype

Not to mention the show was just overall weak in everything in it's first season, particularly the first half. "The Last Outpost." *snicker* Last weeks SG:U episode didn't thrill me. It wasn't bad, but all the desert wandering while bickering wasn't exactly interesting. A lot of time-filler, felt like. I also didn't like how The probe or whatever it is could be interesting, hope they expand on that soon. I was kept wondering about those two as well.

^ I agree LadyCrimson. I think the TV networks see Sci-Fi appealing to the more cerebral end of the market eg. geeks, where Crime/Drama/Reality shows appeal to the mass market. I don't know how many times the networks here in Australia have put on a Sci-Fi show for a couple of months only to relegate it to a later time slot (11pm, 2am, etc) in favour of the more mainstream TV shows.

I've always wanted to go to the UK. The exchange rate is AUD $1 = GBP 0.57 at the moment I've never seen it go over 0.50 like forever (at least 20 years!). Seriously.

Looks like new aliens with advanced technology to be able to hitch a ride without setting off any sensors. Or one of the Destiny's probes. Hard to tell. It had a shield active. Also, why does everyone think Robert Carlyle is so good? Stargate has had a lot better actors in both Atlantis and SG-1. Not sure if this is one of Destiny's probes. It was riding on the wing and took off. But interesting just the same.