Hiro Protagonist

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.

With the value of the US$ going down like a lead balloon and the aussie going through the roof, now is the time to get some Gold!!! Gold prices have sky rocketed. US$1053.00 an ounce and climbing. Even Silver has gone up to $17.00.

Great time to go on a holiday to the States.

I read that article as well, although I'm not sure it's nuclear weapons that has prevented a third world war.

Looks like new aliens with advanced technology to be able to hitch a ride without setting off any sensors.

ah yes. It's not 20 million (where the hell did I get that figure from? ), it's only 1.4 million.

The peace prize also comes with $20 million in cash if I'm not mistaken. I think it would be good for Obama to donate the money to a peace keeping organisation(s) or to a worthwhile cause in the name of peace.

I thought it was a bit retarded as well. Scientists, especially scientists working in that field , would have picked up on something that big and drew the connection before the FBI did as the data appeared to be from a scientific database. I hope we don't see something like this again where something has affected the entire planet in PLAIN SIGHT of everyone but only weeks or months later they only just come across it.

Transformers Revenge of the Fallen. Thought it was pretty good although quite long.

I thought that was classic.

This show comes across as something like Star Trek Voyager. A Ship light years from Earth, people trying to get back to home to Earth, stopping off at planets on their journey, meeting new aliens, etc

great moment. Also, I liked how the kids were all laying down and Charlie standing there... it was eerie at first and then what happened next when they got up was creepy.

^ That's what they did with Terminator The Sarah Connor Chronicles. First Season was great with 9 episodes. Second Season sucked with 22 episodes (except for the last episode).

Just watched Halo Wars and didn't realise it was the cut scenes from the game stuck together to make a "movie". Not having played the game, I didn't get the whole story but managed to get the general idea of what was going on. Kind of feels like a wasted download but still... Brilliant animation though.